


Laura Barton: The story

by zephsomething



Series: Rewriting MCU [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2018-07-12
Packaged: 2018-12-17 02:43:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 70,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11842302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zephsomething/pseuds/zephsomething
Summary: I rewrote Age of Ultron, fell in love with the idea of Laura having a life and a personality outside of 'Clint Barton's secret wife' and now we're here. (I'll add tags as they come up if they're important)Most MCU characters (and a few comic ones) will show up at some point or another, I'll tag them as they appear if they're recurring characters.As it turns out, this is going to be Part 1. Just for ease of reading in the series I'll end this when it catches up to age of Ultron and Make a new fic on the other side.





	1. Shit. I joined the circus.

**Author's Note:**

> Many Many thanks to Lindy for continued betaing and support of my marvel fic!!

When Laura finished her final exam in her third year of university, once it sank in that she had four whole months until her final year of classes, she felt the wanderlust tugging at her feet again. She’d always figured there'd be time later but here she was nearly twenty one, friendless, and without a single adventure under her feet. So she did what any sensible third year uni student would do. She packed all her stuff into two duffel's and three boxes, put on her most sensible boots, and started driving.

She’d never had much to her name, all of her bags fit easily into the trunk of her car- an older car that broke down more often than it actually ran smoothly. Generally though she was able to fix any of its little problems with the kit she kept under the passenger side seat, so she figured she’d be fine. She made it two cities and three weeks down the highway before she broke down just a couple miles shy of the small town she’d been intending to stop in for gas and snacks.

The creak and sizzle as she popped the hood had her heart sinking before she even saw the engine. It was a mess; every little fix and stop gap she’d done had melted, popped off, or otherwise broken seemingly all at once. “Shit.”

“That seems like the understatement of the century.” Laura whipped towards the voice and saw a boy with a bow resting over his knees perched on top of a nearby fence. He grinned when she raised an eyebrow at him. “Considering all the smoke.”

Laura sighed running a hand through her hair as she looked back at the engine. “Don’t suppose you know any good mechanics?”

“Sorry darling, can’t read your lips when you’re sighing at the engine.” She heard a soft thud and looked up as he walked over to her. “Cloud of smoke was in the way.”

“Read my lips?” Laura tilted her head and looked over at him. Now that he was close enough for her to get a proper look scraggly was the first thing that came to mind. His brown hair fell around his ears, there was dirt on his nose and knobbly knees, and he was wearing cut-off jeans and a t-shirt that was so faded she doubted even he knew what colour it’d been originally. In direct contrast to himself his bow was polished to a shine, the quiver he had slung over his shoulder with a handful of arrows shone brightly with dyed with reds and oranges.

“Yeah it’s what I do mostly.” He turned his head, pushing his hair back to show a hearing aid. “Easier usually than trying to adjust this constantly to hear people.”

“Huh.” Laura glanced at the engine again for a moment before looking back at him and waving her hand at it. “Know anyone who could fix this?”

“Maybe, depends.” His grin was so full of mischief it made him look even younger than she’d guessed originally. “How do you feel about circus folk?”

“I’ve never met any to my knowledge.” Laura barely even finished the sentence when he grabbed her wrist and tugged her towards the field.

“We’d best fix that then!” Her grinned at her over his shoulder.

Which is how ten minutes later she found herself back beside her car, this time with an identical pair the boy had called The Acrobats. The two of them were standing and clicking their tongues while they looked down at her engine. The run through the field and back had left her almost as covered in dust as the boy but the two acrobats almost seemed to repel the dust.

“This engine was held together with duct tape.”

“And gum.”

“And randomly placed nails and screws.”

“None of that was random!” Laura frowned at the boy who was shaking with silent laughter.

“You meant to hold your engine together with gum?” The acrobats turned in unison to raise their eyebrows at her.

“Purposefully?”

“Yes!” Laura crossed her arms defensively. “It worked just fine until today…”

The acrobats exchanged a look that Laura doubted boded well for her car. “We can’t fix this.”

“Can you help me get it into town at least?” She sighed tugging on her braid. She’d had the car since she was a kid, it wasn’t really a surprise that it was totally crapped out, just depressing.

“Should have time.” One of them nodded.

The other lifted a hand to their eyes and looked down the road. “Stroke of luck you broke down on this side of town.”

“Slopes down right away towards town.” The first nodded again.

“Goes right to the mechanic.” Both of them nodded at that and took places on either side of the car, leaving her and the boy to push from the back.

Even with the slope and four of them pushing it still took nearly an hour to get the car from where it had broken down to the mechanics shop. Once there the acrobats left but the boy waved them off and offered to wait with her.

“You’re circus folk.” The mechanic sneered the word after one look at the two of them. Then he looked under the hood of the car and rolled his eyes. “What were you planning here? Some kind of flaming car trick? Was that your plan?”

“I was planning on getting home for school actually.” Laura stepped towards the mechanic and her car. “How much is it going to cost to fix it?”

He looked her over again, then at the boy, clearly thrown off by her school comment. When he looked at the car again though his sneer was replaced with laughter. “Listen girly, I don’t care what you think daddy dearest taught you about cars, this one is so far past drivable you’d have to replace the whole engine, it would be worth more than your car.”

“So you can’t do anything for me then.” Laura sighed and crossed her arms, this guy was already getting on her last nerve.

“I can buy what’s left off of you, salvage it for spare parts.” He scratched the back of his neck. “I could probably go for $200, that should be enough for you to get back to wherever you came from.”

“The tires alone are worth more than that.” She raised an eyebrow at him, she’d replaced the tires and most of the underside of the car just that winter. “The parts are worth at least twelve hundred.”

“Clearly your old man never taught you how to bluff.” The guy snorted side eying her car. “I-”

“Only thing my old man taught me was how to duck and step around shattered bottles.” Laura interrupted her last nerve shattering against the fact that he assumed her father had taught her anything useful at all.

The mechanic blanched and she could almost feel the boy reappraising her. “Well, uh I suppose I could give you a grand for it, I’m sure I’ll make it up in parts.”

“That’s fine.” Laura nodded and the mechanic muttered something she didn’t quite hear as he walked off towards his till.

There was complete silence for the few minutes until he returned with the paperwork and cash. Once she’d filled it out and dealt with it all, he mumbled something about giving her some space to gather her personal effects and went as far away from her as he could without leaving his shop.

Laura rolled her eyes and set about gathering her stuff. She stacked her boxes on a nearby bench and condensed most of the stuff from her smaller duffel into the larger one. Everything from the car went into the mostly empty duffel.

“So what’s your plan now?” The boy asked after she’d given her car one last pat and was staring at her pile of boxes.

“Catch a bus home I guess, do the sensible thing and get a job for the rest of the summer.” Laura sighed hooking the larger duffel over her shoulders like a backpack. “Any idea where the nearest bus station is?”

“Closed about an hour ago.” He shrugged, then lifted her boxes up. “I’m sure I can convince my lot to keep you for the night if-”

“Listen girl I don’t know where you’re from but getting mixed up with them is not in your best interest.” The mechanic was at her side almost instantly. “There’s a nice motel up the road I’m sure they’ll give you a fair rate,-”

“Okay.” Laura turned her best ‘I’m so done with you’ city girl look on him, the one that had people jumping out of her way on the sidewalk. “That car was the only stable thing in my life since I was a small child and you wouldn’t even entertain the idea of trying to fix her. You get absolutely no say in where I go from here.” She swung her smaller duffel over her shoulder, only missing the mechanic because he jumped out of the way, and strode past the now grinning boy.

She’d hoped he’d just follow her and to her pleasant surprise she could hear the footsteps behind her that told her that was exactly what he’d done. They walked in silence until just outside the town’s limits.

“So not a fan of the mechanic then?” He said speeding up a little so they walked shoulder to shoulder, so he could see her face.

“Heard it all then?” She gave him a wry grin. “At least your acrobats looked at the engine, he had all the parts needed to fix her, he just didn’t care.”

“We weren’t much help on that front, this town only likes us when we’re at the circus, in costume, and it's dark out.” He chuckled but there was no mirth in it. “You don’t seem bothered though.”

“Like I said earlier, I’ve never met any circus folk before you.” She tugged on her braid. “And I know better than to trust other folk’s opinions on people.”

“You never went to the circus as a kid?” He grinned as they set out across the field, sun setting behind them. “Oh, you are in for a treat!”

She chuckled at his rapid turn of mood and quiet fell between them until they were close enough that she could see the lights and hear the laughter of the circus. “Are you sure I won’t be imposing?”

“Course not, your stuff can stay in my carriage. I usually sleep on the roof anyway.” He grinned as they skirted the edges of the lights towards a series of parked R.V.s. One had similar colours to the boy’s quiver and that was the one he opened the door to. He dropped her boxes on a bunk that looked like it hadn’t been slept in since the sheets were last changed and gestured for her to drop the duffel bags as well. “This is you, for the night at least. I’m Clint by the way.”

She dropped the bags and took his offered hand, shaking firmly. “Laura.”

“Fair warning, the next few hours might be a little overwhelming. If you need to hide and can’t find me, just let any of us know that you’re my friend.” He grinned and pulled out an outfit out of a cupboard she hadn’t even noticed. It was the most ridiculous mix of purple, pink, and yellow she’d ever seen. “They’ll find someplace quiet to stash you.”

“Thank you.” She said quietly, turning to give him privacy to change in.

“You just have to do one thing.” He moved to stand in front of her once he was changed, quiver on his back and bow over his shoulder. “You have to watch my act.”

“You really are a child aren’t you?” Her voice was full of laughter as she followed him out the door and towards the circus. He walked backwards in front of her, whether to show off or just to see her face better she wasn’t sure.

“I resent that!” He crossed his arms. “I’ll have you know I’m twenty years old.”

“Shit.” She stopped blinking at him for a moment as it sank in. “You’re my age.”

“Ha! Who’s the child now?”

“Still you kid.” Someone wearing a top hat laughed reaching over to ruffle Clint’s hair then turned and called towards the tent. “Hawkeye’s late again! And this time he has a friend!”

Laura snorted and mouthed ‘Hawkeye’ at Clint who just grinned and shrugged at her.

“Hurry up and get your friend seated kid, we’re on in ten.” Top Hat pointed towards a tent.

“Come on!” Clint, or Hawkeye rather, caught her hand and dragged her off towards the tent.

In minutes she was seated with a drink and a bag of cotton candy in the front row of bleachers and Clint was gone, slipping off behind a hardly noticeable curtain doorway. Just in time too because it was only seconds after the curtain had stopped shivering that people started filing in and seating themselves. A few of them shot her annoyed looks but she just focused on her cotton candy and coke.

The show was spectacular, acrobats, trained dogs, clowns, and then Clint came out and from the cheering she could tell he was a fan favourite around here, at least as Hawkeye. He however hardly seemed to notice them and when he drew him bow to shoot the first arrow she could see why. He’d taken out his hearing aids. His performance was impressive, ever target he aimed at he hit dead center. He used all number of trick arrows including one that he shot straight up followed immediately by a second arrow which, when they collided at the peak of their arcs, exploded into a miniature firework. Then he scanned the crowd, grinning when he met her eye.

“For my next trick I’ll need a volunteer! You! You look like a lovely young lady!” He held out a hand towards her with a grin. Laura rolled her eyes but took his hand anyway and let him pull her to her feet. “Fabulous! Ladies, gents, and friends of all sizes! Tonight I will perform one of the classics and shoot an apple right off of the lovely maiden’s head!”

She raised an eyebrow at him but caught the apple that was tossed to her from behind the curtain. She smiled slightly at the applause that simple trick caused. She took the position Clint indicated, standing right in front of one of his large wooden circle targets and balancing the apple on her head.

Then Clint came over and made a show of changing her posture, shifting the apple, and leaned close enough while doing so that only she would hear him. “Trust me?”

‘Not if you hit me’ Laura mouthed it rather than speaking out loud when Clint pulled back far enough to read her lips.

He grinned and all but danced over to the line he shot from. Once there he took two exaggerated steps back and pulled an arrow from his quiver. Before it even left the bow she could tell it wouldn’t hit the apple. It just barely missed the side of her face and she could feel it quivering where it had embedded itself into the wood behind her. The crowd’s gasping and Clint’s over shocked expression nearly made her snort but she managed to pull a worried expression to her face instead. The next stuck in the wood just above the apple, soliciting awe’s from the audience. Then Clint caught her eye tilting his chin down just slightly, just enough she’d see it. She bent her knees just as he released the arrow. It embedded itself in the wood where the back of her head had been resting just seconds before and caught on it, with the arrow through the dead center, was the apple. As the crowd responded with shock and awe the two of them exchanged grins before bowing to the audience.

She sat back down as Clint exited the stage and the acrobats came out again for the end performance. The rest of the show went quickly and once it was over she was caught by one of the acrobats as she left the tent.

Apologies and attempted explanations tumbled out of the mouths of a handful of performers as soon as she got to the sectioned off behind a curtain portion that counted as a backstage, the kid gets ahead of himself, the kid never thinks first, we don’t know what he was trying to do. When she held her hand up they quieted but it was just in time for Clint to come shooting around the corner with his hands going a mile a minute and that was the first time she’d ever regretted not doing more than one signing class in uni. His hands stilled the second he took in the crowd around Laura and her hand up at shoulder level.

“Right.” Laura looked around and then jerked her thumb at Clint. “He asked and gave warning before shooting an arrow at my face.”

“He didn’t say-”

“Didn’t have to!” Clint interrupted fiddling with his hearing aid and grinning. “She read my signals.”

“You’re not hard to read.” Laura scoffed but from the looks everyone was giving her she’d guess they disagreed with that statement.

“I like her.” One of the acrobats who’d tried to help with her car stepped forward, their identical pair half a step behind them.

“She's got spunk.” Nods went around the circle and the acrobats waved their hands at Clint. “You’re done for the night anyway, you don’t have a games shift tonight.”

“Go show your friend around.”

“Change first!”

“Thanks!” Clint grinned around the circle and dashed off leaving Laura to follow him. Which she did, though she rolled her eyes first. By the time she got to the R.V. with his colours on it he was already standing outside of it in cut-offs and a different faded shirt than he’d been wearing that morning.

The rest of the night was a blur of food, games, and talking. Clint seemed to be genuinely interested in hearing her talk about her life as a student (exhausting and boring), what she was studying (Psychology and evolutionary biology), and her social life (non-existent). It probably helped that she was also interested in what he did (archery mostly), the day to day life of the circus (exhausting but fun), and his hobbies (few and far between but he did like reading). Any of which he could talk about for ages.

Once the non-circus folk had all gone back to town and clean up started Laura automatically helped with the parts Clint was assigned to work on. As they took down games and packed them into the R.V.s he explained that this was their last day in this town and the more they got done now the longer they got to sleep in in the morning.

“I thought she was your guest Clint?” Top Hat was back and this time they were raising their eyebrows at where Laura was helping Clint fold up one of the smaller games tents. “But so far you’ve shot arrows at her, and had her help cleaning.”

“Ah…” Clint’s hand went to the back of his neck and Laura easily caught the fabric he’d dropped and finished folding it. She placed it on one of the nearby tables before turning back to Top Hat.

“It’s the least I can do.” Laura held out her hand with a small smile. “I’m Laura, Clint tried to help me with my car when it broke down and then offered me a place to stay for the night when it turned out I had to sell it. I’ll be out of everyone’s hair as soon as the bus station opens up and I can get myself home.”

“The acrobats were right. You’ve got spunk, and you’re quick to defend those you consider worth defending.” Top Hat nodded as they shook her hand. “Where is home for you?”

Her first thought was the car she’d left in the mechanic’s garage but she grinned and jerked her thumb back towards where she’d come from instead. “New York, I’m studying at a Uni there.”

“If you wanted you could come with us. The kid’s act could use livening up and you’d have to work the games on occasion but you’d make a small wage and we travel around the country. We’re due to pass New York in august if we stay on schedule.”

“Are you offering me a job?”

“You’d have to share Clint’s R.V. but yes, I suppose I am.” Top Hat nodded.

“I don’t even know your name.” Laura laughed but as she looked around at the way the circus folk moved around each other with an ease that spoke of practice and patience she knew it didn’t make any difference. “I’ll do it.”

“Call me Clary, or Sir, or Ma’am.” Clary held a hand out to her and Laura shook their hand again. “Welcome to the circus Laura.”

Clint was grinning at her as Clary walked away, practically bouncing on his toes. “I knew they’d like you.”

“You planned this whole thing didn’t you?”

“You’ll never convince anyone else of that.” He laughed tossing the bundle of poles that went with the tent towards her. “That should be the last of it. Cook’s probably wondering where we are.”

“Is Cook the cook?” She followed him to the R.V.s, on the far side of them from where the circus had been were a dozen fires around which sat the various circus folk, only a dozen of whom she’d met.

“Head cook technically, everyone is supposed to help her out, swap days the same way we do with games shifts.” Clint explained, heading towards the biggest fire where the tallest skinniest lady Laura had ever seen was ladling stew into bowls.

“You had help and you are still late to dinner.” Her voice carried easily across to where they were just approaching the fire but despite her tone her eyes held laughter in their corners. “How are you going to survive when you leave here?”

“I told you Cook I don’t plan on leaving the circus at all.”

“Hmm.” She handed Laura a bowl while nodding to herself. “You’re good for a summer hire, pleased to meet you.”

“And I, you.” Laura responded automatically and then bit her lip at the old phrasing.

Cook however just let out a pleased laugh and patted her hand. “Yes, a good summer hire.”

As soon as Laura sat on one of the nearby benches the day’s events all seemed to rush into her bones at once and it took all her concentration just to eat her stew. She was vaguely aware of finishing it and of a voice chiding Clint, she tried to say it wasn’t his fault, it was hers for not noticing how tired she was. Then there was an arm around her waist and Clint’s voice quiet and calm in her ear. It gave her something to focus on and by the time they were back at the door of his R.V., hers now too she supposed, she was feeling almost back in control of her body. She reached out and tapped Clint so she could be sure he was paying attention.

“Sorry…” She tugged on her braid as she apologized. “I just didn’t notice how tired I was until I sat down.”

“It happens, not your fault.” Clint shrugged and opened the door. “Sorry I didn’t notice.”

“I’m hard to read.” Laura waved a hand as Clint cleared the boxes and bags off the bed.

“It’s all yours.” Clint gestured towards the now clean bed. “Tomorrow if you want we can make up one of the other bunks for you.”

“I don’t mind.” Laura perched on the bed. “I doubt you’ve slept in this bed more than a handful of times.”

She was asleep before her head even hit the pillow so she had no idea what his reply to that was. The sleep that followed was one of the deepest and most dreamless sleeps she’d had in years. She wasn’t sure if it was the light or the movement that woke her up the next morning just that once she was awake she was suddenly aware of both. Then she noticed that a blanket had been tucked around her. She ran a hand over her face and got up, grabbing her toothbrush and heading to the bathroom. Once she dropped into the passenger seat of the R.V., beside Clint who was driving, the past 24 hours rushed to the forefront of her mind.

“Shit. I joined the circus.” She stared out the window at the caravan of R.V.s as Clint’s laughter filled the space between them.

 


	2. Tell Me a Story?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laura and Clint talk about stars, among other things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to Lindy (Rooish on tumblr) for all the help with editing !!

The first week after Laura joined the circus was a blur of driving, performing, and practicing. For the most part, she and Clint kept conversations light and practice focused on perfecting their ‘audience member’ routine. A week, four towns, and one city away from where she’d joined, Clary presented her with a costume that was not dissimilar from Clint’s and a matched set of throwing knives that shone like an oil slick when the light hit them. 

“Now it’s about time you and Clint got a proper act together I think.” Clary nodded tapping the packet of knives. “You seem like a knife person to me but... just tell me if I’m wrong and I’ll find you something that suits.”

“They’re lovely.” Laura looked down at the knives a smile playing on her face. She loved any weapon they she could throw, axes had been a favourite of hers but knives were more precise; plus, this was a rather nice set.

“Good.” Clary nodded gesturing for Clint to pay attention. “I’ve pulled the two of you out of the roster for the next two days, no games, no preforming. Focus on a new routine.”

“Nice.” Clint grinned as Clary hurried off, no doubt to rearrange more schedules. He turned to Laura and his grin grew wider. “Try it on!”

“Yeesh.” The knives she tucked into her pocket before holding up the costume. The thing looked very much like Clint’s except the colours were deeper, plum and magenta with near gold accents, and the materiel shimmered.

When she stepped into the R.V. to try it on, she was thrilled to see that it had a dozen reinforced pockets sewn into various places for the knives. There was also a little belt with a handful of pouches which was almost as functional as it was pretty. She stepped out of the R.V. and spun slowly for Clint and the handful of other performers he’d managed to wave over.

There was a scattering of applause and then most of them drifted off back to whatever they had been doing before. All except the identical acrobats whose names she’d learned were Dakota and River. Of course they were still next to impossible to tell apart, she could swear they practiced being the same.

“E and A did a good job on you.” One of them said with a nod.

“You’ll outshine him on stage every time.” The other nodded and jerked a thumb towards Clint.

“But can you throw those knives?” The other gestured towards the knife that was visible where it was attached to her belt.

“Can’t be that much different from an axe, just smaller.” Laura shrugged.

“Oh.” Dakota and River exchanged a look that screamed of shared secrets. Then they recovered with a grin. “We will miss you after you leave.” They waved before running off towards where the main rent was being set up.

“Ominous.” Laura raised an eyebrow but turned to Clint and unsheathed the knives that were tucked between her wrists and the sleeves of her outfit. “Should we practice?”

“I’ll grab the targets.” Clint’s childlike enthusiasm for the whole thing was contagious and soon Laura was grinning and laughing along with him as they practiced. Most of the morning was given over to target practice, with Clint alternating between shooting at targets and correcting Laura’s form.

By the time Cook was lighting fires, they had a routine more or less figured out. It helped that Clint already had a routine that they could use as a starting point, simply adding in some parts for her and her knives and leaving room for them to bounce off one another.

Around the time they would usually be collapsing into bed, they had a solid order for their routine. All they had left to do was work the kinks out of it and that they could do in the morning.

Laura curled under her blanket expecting to fall asleep as easily as she had every other day since joining the circus. Instead she lay awake, tossing and turning for what felt like years. When she checked the time and saw that only an hour had passed she decided her best course of action was to get up and get some air. She grabbed a thermos full of tea on her way out of the R.V. in the hopes that a warm drink might help put her to sleep.

“You’re usually asleep in seconds, something bugging you?” Clint’s voice behind and above startled her and she turned to glare up at him rather than answer. When she didn’t respond Clint just kept talking. “I never did like sleeping inside much, too hot and too closed in.”

Laura stared for a moment trying to think of a response, then she held up the thermos. “Want some tea?”

“I’m usually more of a coffee guy, but sure.” Clint shifted slightly, patting the roof beside where he was sitting. “Come on up.”

“You know the first time you said you slept on the roof I thought you were joking.” She passed the tea up before climbing the ladder.

“Most people do.” Clint opened the thermos as she settled onto the blanket next to him. Once he’d poured some of it into the lid he handed the thermos to her. “I blame my face.”

“Yeah, you don’t have a very serious face.” Laura chuckled crossing her legs and poking his cheek. “You look too much like a kid.”

“Alright grandma.” Clint snickered into his tea. “Was it just my youthful beauty keeping you up then?”

“Contrary to what this last week would have you think, I don’t usually sleep easy. Or much.” Laura sipped her tea and looked out to where the stars seemed to rest on top of a nearby hill.

Clint was quiet for a few minutes, staring out in the same direction as her, with his fingers tapping so gently on the blanket she doubted he even noticed he was doing it. “So it’s been a good week then?”

“Yeah.” Laura nodded slowly surprise colouring her voice. “Yeah it has been actually.”

“You seem surprised.” His shoulder bumped against hers. “Or awestruck maybe.”

“It’s been awhile since I had a whole week of consecutively good days.” She looked down at the thermos as she said it. There was an impulse to pass it off as a joke, smile, maybe laugh, but then Clint’s shoulder was a warm solid pressure again hers and she just let the words hang in the quiet around them instead. 

The silence stretched between them like a blanket as they drank their tea. Laura was almost debating going back to her bed when Clint shifted, the warmth of his shoulder against hers gone as he pointed up at the stars. “I used to call that cluster of stars the flower, right up until Clary bought me an astronomy book.”

Laura followed the angle of his finger to the cluster of stars he was pointing at and couldn’t help the giggles that bubbled out of her. “I’m sure Orion would be thrilled.”

“I thought so.” Clint grinned at her before laying back on the blanket. “What about you? Any silly names for the stars when you were a kid?"

“No, silly names weren’t allowed.” Laura answered as she lay back as well. Out here they could see almost all the stars, turned out the sky was full of them. “I used to tell myself stories about them though, until my mother overheard me anyway.”

“What happened?” She could see his frown out of the corner of her eye, like he was preparing to fight someone.

“We had a long talk about lies and how telling stories wasn’t going to get me anywhere in life, and didn’t I realize how it looked when I spoke out loud to myself?” She shrugged looking up at the stars to avoid watching his expression. 

He made an annoyed noise but said the last thing she'd expected from him. He pointed up at one of the stars. “Tell me a story about that one?”

“You’re such a child.” Laura muttered but it brought a smile to her face anyway and she shifted closer to him so he could hear her more easily. “So that star has a planet that orbits it, okay? A planet so small it only has one climate so everything is adapted to living in it. The weather is always very warm, almost desert like, so most creatures have scales and extra places to store water, plants are almost exclusively the kind that hold water inside them. There’s very little water above ground so most of the sentient creatures have adapted to live underground where there are small streams. Little do they know it’s been gradually getting further and further from it’s sun with each rotation. Soon they’ll start to get frost, in a few years at most.”

“Is that anything like the stories you told as a kid?”

“In simpler terms probably.” Her expression as she stared out at the stars was almost wistful. “And usually they ended with me leaving for the planet, or the people of that planet coming to Earth and taking me.”

“And your parents weren’t fans of that ending?” His tone was mostly joking, feigning shock.

“Didn’t match up with their plans for my future.” Laura laughed as her sentence registered with her in terms of where she was currently. “This wouldn’t either, basically nothing I did after about sixteen lined up with their plans.”

“Rebellious teenager huh?” Clint raised an eyebrow. “I joined the circus, what did you do?”

“Got a scholarship to a prestigious school that would fast track me to university, moved into the dorms, and changed my name.” She rattled it off with so much ease she surprised herself, said that way it sounded half like a joke. “No one really knows about that these days though.”

“Wow, you were a truly terrible teenager.” He let out a noise that was almost a chuckle.

“Aren’t you going to ask why?” Laura asked turning her head to watch him. Everyone she’d ever told about the name change had immediately started pestering her about why she’d changed it.

“Not really my business is it?” He turned towards her and smiled, she couldn’t tell if it was the moonlight that made his face look softer or not. “Plus, I’m sure if you decide it is my business you’ll tell me.”

“You’re weird, did you know that?” She watched as his shoulder shifted in a shrug. Then she lifted a hand to try and cover a yawn. “I should go to bed.”

“Just sleep here, moving will only wake you up again.” Clint suggested his eyes half closed, looking like he was already half asleep.

“I can’t sleep on a roof with no blanket over me.” She sat up and rolled her eyes.

“Suit yourself.” Clint rolled himself up in the blanket almost as soon as she was off of it. “Sweet dreams.”

“Yeah you too.” Laura said climbing down and into the R.V., despite what Clint thought she fell asleep easily once she was back under her blankets.

The smell of warm cooked food and coffee woke her in the morning. When she sat up Clint was sitting on one of the chairs with a textbook of hers that she’d decided to keep on the table. Next to the textbook was a pot still half full of coffee and two take out containers only one of which was open.

“You almost look like a university student, sitting like that.” Laura chuckled and rolled out of bed. He didn’t have a chance to respond before she was heading towards the bathroom to get ready for the day. Once she was done, clean clothes and brushed teeth, she sat down across the table from him and Clint pushed the closed takeout container towards her. Inside was bacon, pancakes, and scrambled eggs. “Did you go all the way into town already this morning?”

“Had to get stuff to fix up the targets anyway.” He shrugged while glaring at her textbook like it had done something to slight him personally. “You can read this stuff?”

“Well yeah, I’ve been studying it for the last three or four years.” Laura nodded and pulled the text towards herself. She skimmed the page he’d been glaring at quickly. “See here, it’s talking about how the chemicals in your brain can have an extreme effect on your behavior even if they’ve only undergone minor changes.”

“Well why didn’t it just say that then?” Clint shot another glare at the book. “Instead it’s written in some kind of bullshit code.”

“Yeah kind of,” Laura shrugged again, closing the book in the hopes that Clint would maybe stop glaring at it. “The different kinds of imbalances and types of chemicals are important if you’re studying it, not so much if you just thought it looked interesting.”

“It all makes a lot more sense when you explain it.” He shrugged drinking his coffee straight from the pot much to Laura’s amusement.

“Thanks.” Laura rolled her eyes working her way through her breakfast. “So we going to go through the routine today.”

“Yeah, Clary wants us ready in time for the finale tonight.” Clint nodded and stretched, both his coffee pot and take out container empty.

Once they were suited up they spent the morning working their routine. Getting rid of the parts that didn't flow and figuring out the bits where one or the other didn't know what to say or how to act. After what felt like at once both years and no time at all the acrobats have been sent to give them a quick snack and point them towards the big tent with a 10 minute warning. By the time they had gotten to the tent and eaten it was only a moment or two before the act before them came back into the closed off area behind the curtain and out went the acrobats setting up all the targets for Clint and Laura's act and interacting with the audience.

That’s when Clint removed his hearing aids, tucking them into a pocket that looked like it had been added to his outfit for that exact purpose. Laura followed him out onto the stage, both of them grinning and waving to the audience.

Their act was three parts long and as the audience cheered they split apart to start the first act. Targets hung or stood around them in a loose circle. This first part was designed to impress the audience with their aim and to lull them a little. Clint’s arrows and her knives clustered in the center of the targets as the audience cheered. Once he ran out of arrows and she ran out of knives they bumped shoulders, their signal that they were clear to retrieve them from the targets. Bows were made towards the audience as they gathered their things, arrows returned to Clint’s quiver and Laura’s knives to her pockets. He exchanged that quiver with one that had been tucked behind a target; four of the arrows in the new quiver were ordinary, the others all trick arrows for the finale.

Laura finished collecting her knives and pulled an apple out of one of her pouches, tossing it from hand to hand as she walked towards one of the largest targets. Clint took him place a dozen steps from her. She presented the apple holding it in her left hand outstretched to the side of her body, just before Clint let his arrow fly she dropped her hand pulling the Apple down and away from where his arrow would have pinned it. A grin crept onto her face as she tossed the apple from her left to her right hand and Clint made a show of being annoyed. This time when his arrow flew she bounced her palm tossing the apple up and over her head to her left hand grinning outright as the audience gasped. One of the kids in the audience let out a whoop so loud Laura actually turned towards them so she could wink in their direction.

Then she placed the apple on her head showing both of her empty hands to the audience as he readied another arrow. This part had both of them grinning before they even started. Clint’s arrow flew and she ducked at exactly the right time for the arrow to catch the apple as it fell pinning it to the target right where her head had been only seconds before, dead center between the other two arrows. The crowd erupted into cheers and hollers as the two of them took a bow.

The last part of the act required only a little more skill than the first part but it was far more showy. This is where they used Clint’s trick arrows. They’d realize that if Clint hit her knives it would set off the trick portion of the trick arrows in much the same way it did if he hit two arrows into each other. So this part started with Laura tossing her knives in the air and catching them as they came back down, nearly but not quite juggling. Then Laura tossed one of the knives higher and Clint’s arrow arced so that the knife hit it at the top of it’s upwards momentum. Each arrow they hit correctly set off fireworks, flames, or light shows as the crowed mixed noises of awe in with their cheers.

Once Clint ran out of arrows Laura tucked her knives into her pockets and the two of the took their final bow. Then they waved as they headed off of center stage. Their entire act completed in complete silence on their part.

“A grand finale for our final day here!” Clary’s voice boomed as she strode past them and towards the center stage. She continued talking but they were swept up in the congratulations and critiques from the other performers.

They used the next few hours after the performances were done but before the games and foods booths closed to repair and pack up their equipment. The first things they set about doing were restitching the targets, making sure none of the knives or arrows had chipped, and carefully packing the bits that turned Clint’s arrows from regular ones to trick ones. Once everything was packed and sorted and the last few circus goers were trickling back to the town they turned to each other and grinned, the last bits of performing adrenaline finally fading away.

“We did it.” Clint said shooting a grin at her over the last target they were fitting into the back of the R.V.

“And you didn’t even blow me up a little.” Laura returned his grin with a wry one of her own.

 


	3. Idealism

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The circus is the place to go if you want to meet some strange and interesting people.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clint speaks a random mix of both signed English and ASL so his grammar is all over the place and he rarely signs with anyone but himself so that really doesn’t help. While Laura speaks several languages I do not and thus all her non English words are pulled from Google Translate and/or a dictionary.  
> Many thanks to Lindy (rooish on tumblr) for editing this extremely self indulgent fic!

“Oh come off it River, you could hardly even balance on a beam when we first joined!” Dakota laughed, nearly knocking over her plate from dinner. “That’s the whole reason we got so good, we had to practice all the time.”

“Yeah, every day.” Once caught in their exaggeration, River nodded easily along with Dakota’s explanation. “For hours, it was awful. Always covered in bruises.”

“We looked like those things shrinks hold up and make you guess the idea of.” Dakota said, shooting a grin at Laura.

“An inkblot test?” She raised an eyebrow. “You must have fallen an awful lot.”

“Oh all the time.” River nodded enthusiastically.

“We’d reach to catch-”

“-and whoosh!”

“And one of us would slip-”

“I mean the safety net was always there,”

“But it still hurts to land on it.” Dakota finished their back and forth rubbing the back of their neck.

“You didn’t die though.” Clint pointed out grinning at the two of them. “Which makes it plenty better than landing on the floor.”

“True, true.” River nodded mimicking Clint’s grin. “And as a bonus we didn’t have to shoot projectiles at each other.”

Laura let out a laugh at that which had Clint crossing his arms in a pout that was to dramatic to be genuine. “He’s a good shot to be fair.”

“Yeah!” Clint exclaimed sticking his tongue out at the acrobats. “I’m a great shot!”

“As long as you keep hitting what you aim for you can keep that claim.” Laura said bumping her shoulder easily against his.

“See? She believes in me.”

“You haven’t given me reason to doubt you yet.” Laura said with a shrug, pretending she didn’t notice the looks Dakota and River were giving each other.

—

Laura stuck the last of the equipment back in the R.V. and booked it for the area where they’d set up their fire pits, as it was plenty warm outside still, she and Clint were on cooking duty with Cook today and she didn’t want to be late. Just before she careened around the corner of the barricade they’d put up between the circus and the cooking area, she heard Cook’s voice. Something in her tone made Laura skid to a stop and listen. She didn’t sound unkind, just knowing in a way Laura had learned to pay attention to.

“I’ve told you before boy you’re going to leave here eventually, you need to learn these things.”

“This is my home.” Clint’s voice sounded tired in a way Laura hadn’t yet heard, like he already knew the words that came next.

“It’s in the stars, the stars always know.” There was a lift in Cook’s voice that had Laura picturing Cook’s long rolling shrug perfectly, the one that started at her shoulders and ended with her hands splayed out, often waving a knife and causing someone to jump out of the way. “Your love will lead you away from here, or your life will, they’re less clear on the reason.”

“Here we go…”

“You’re going to make your mark on the world Clint, can’t do that from here.”

“I don’t want to make a mark on the world.” There was another note she hadn’t heard in Clint’s voice before, stress or maybe fear. “The world didn’t want me remember?”

“The world doesn’t have to want you to remember you.”

There was a pause and when they didn’t seem keen on saying anything else Laura took several carefully silent steps backwards before breaking into a run and whipping into the kitchen area they’d set up.

“Did I miss anything?” Laura said dropping her hands to her knees and sucking in air like she was out of breath.

“Not even a little bit.” Clint grinned and gestured for her to join him at the large table they’d covered in plastic which in turn was covered in vegetables.

“Oh goodie chopping duty.” Laura grinned back and took her pick of the knives as she headed for the table.

“Remember-”

“Bite sized pieces!” Laura and Clint chorused along with them. “We know.”

—

The noise of the kettle boiling had Laura looking up from the textbook she was reading just in time to see Clint moving his hands and raising an eyebrow at her. His hands flicked in precise motions towards her, himself, and the kettle as well as some movements between but she had no idea what he was trying to communicate. “Какие?"

He looked at her confusion plain on his face for almost thirty seconds before she realized she hadn’t spoken English.

“What did that mean?” Laura elaborated, in English this time, and gestured to his hands. Then she got up to turn off the kettle and make her tea.

“Ah.” Clint looked down at his hands as his ears took on a pink tint. “I was signing, asking if you wanted me to get the kettle.”

“You should teach me to do that, teach me to speak with my hands.” Laura grinned at him as she sat down with her mug of tea. When he just raised an eyebrow at her she kept talking. “I could teach you Spanish, or Russian or maybe-”

“The ones I know are enough for me thanks.” Clint held up a hand already shaking his head. “I can teach you to sign though, it would make talking easier for sure. How many languages do you speak anyway?”

“With any amount of fluency?” Laura shrugged. “Just Spanish, English, and Russian, I’m pretty decent at French, too, and I know enough to hold a conversation in a handful of others.”

“Why in the world do you need to know so many languages?”

“You never know who you might need to talk to.” Laura shrugged tapping her textbook. “The more languages you know the more places you can go without someone picking up on the fact that you’re out of place.”

“You’re weird.” Clint chuckled then grinned and held up his three middle fingers and moved them up and down while moving his hand across his chin. “There, now you know one sign.”

“A very useful one I’m sure.” Laura rolled her eyes but repeated the motion, she had a feeling most of her lessons were going to be like that.

He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to her. It was creased and worn around the edges but still legible. “Here, this is the alphabet for American sign, if you memorize that then you can spell out any words you don’t know. Also your name, which is useful.”

“Thanks.” Laura grinned picking up the piece of paper and finding her the letters for her name first. She spent most of the rest of the afternoon while they drove spelling out her and Clint’s names, and memorizing the various letters. The first time she swore in Russian (her finger cramped up) and Clint grinned she decided she’d teach him the languages too.

—

Laura walked slowly through the town with her bag slung over her shoulder, bits and pieces from the hardware store tucked carefully against each other in it to replenish the repair supplies for their props. It was a beautiful day, sun warm on her skin with a light breeze to stop the air from weighing her down and a handful of clouds scattered across the sky. She closed her eyes while she waited for a crosswalk to change, taking a deep breath and smelling the promise of rain.

Then she felt a hand on her arm and she tensed as she opened her eyes, pulling back on her reflexes to fight, as this wasn’t the time or the place.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you darling, just wanted to tell you how very pretty you looked.” His smile was trying at charming, but between the hand that was still on her arm and the proximity with which he was standing, he was missing charming by a long shot.

“Thank you.” The smile felt tight on her face as she took a step backwards, clearly putting distance between them and hoping he’d get the message.

“Pretty girl like you shouldn’t be all on your own.” His smile widened and rather than dropping his hand to his side he offered his arm to her. “I’m not busy I can walk you wherever you’re going.”

“I prefer being on my own thank you.” Laura’s smile tightened but she forced it to stay in place. “I’m sure there are more important things to do with your time.”

“I was just trying to pay you a compliment you bitch.” His ‘trying for charming’ smile shattered as red appeared on his cheeks.

“That’s quite alright love, I’m sure you meant it to.” Laura felt an arm sling around her shoulders, lightly and with almost no pressure against her at all.

“It’s just see she’s with us.” This voice came from her other side and she looked between them her smile strengthening itself as she took them in. The both of them were long and gangly, almost inhuman looking, with wispy blond and red hair respectively, and noses that were almost too long for their faces. They were however without a doubt some of the prettiest people she’d ever met. Without their bright costumes though she barely recognized them.

“And we should be getting back to the circus.” The blond grinned at the man, who now looked quite uncomfortable.

“So off you go then.” The redhead’s grin was all teeth and Laura decided on the spot she needed to learn how to do that, it was entirely disconcerting.

The man shot them a dirty look and stormed off mumbling slurs and swears under his breath. As soon as he was gone the two who’d come to her rescue both stepped away and in front of her.

“You’re alright then?”

“He looked like he was one of them types that won’t take no for an answer.”

“And we freaks and outliers gotta stick together.”

“It’s really much easier to get rid of them when you’re in a group.” The two of them bounced easily off of each other looking at her with a smiling sort of concern.

“Yeah I’m fine, thanks for the hand.” She nodded tugging on her braid. “It’s nice to end one of these moments without a fight.”

“Always nice not being banned from towns isn’t it?” The blond grinned a mirror of the redhead’s all teeth grin, this time with more warmth in it, and Laura wondered just how many towns they’d been banned from. Then they were both waving and walking off, chattering fast at each other in a language Laura couldn’t quite place. It wasn’t until they were gone that she was able to place them as the two who walked around the circus on stilts selling goodies and tickets and passing banter back and forth.

The rest of her trip was rather uneventful comparatively. She picked up coffee, tea, and some snacks at the local grocers, and took a wander through their bookstore picking up a few books she’d been waiting for. By the time she got back the sun was well on its way to setting and she could hear the circus long before she saw it. She wasn’t worried though there was plenty of time to change and find Clint before they headed for the performers tent.

Later that night, after the performances were over and the crowds had mostly gone home, Laura and Clint were trading barbs about their act as they walked towards the eating area they’d set up when Laura felt someone fall into step beside her. She turned to raise an eyebrow at them and then grinned as she recognized the wispy red hair.

“Told you it was her!” They turned towards the blond as soon as she’d looked at them.

“Guess we weren’t lying to the asshole after all.” The blond grinned at her, waving at a confused looking Clint.

“Nope! Here she is in all her performing glory.”

“Complete with bright costume and props that double as weapons.”

“Hi Clint.” One of them waved around her and Clint just frowned at the lot of them.

There was a pause in the conversation as they all stopped to get bowls and rolls and spoons but once they were all seated around a table that looked like it had seen better days the conversation resumed.

“What asshole?” Clint raised an eyebrow at Laura and she realized she hadn’t even mentioned the incident when she met up with him. She shrugged and let the stilt walkers respond for her.

“Just some jerk in town.”

“Thought she was pretty.”

“And clearly had never heard the word no before.”

“Poor boy, I can’t imagine how boring his childhood must have been.”

“One of them.” Clint chuckled with an eyeroll that was more than a little exaggerated. “I almost feel sorry for the guy, Laura here coulda kicked his ass.”

“It was nice not having to though.” Laura grinned across at them, then stuck her hand out as she realized something. “Shit right, I’m Laura. I don’t think we’ve formally met yet?”

The blond looked at her hand like a handshake was an unknown concept but the redhead reached out and shook her hand easily. “Names Liv, she means we haven’t exchanged names.”

“Ah, this is Azure, I’m Olive.” Olive grinned at her. “We bonded at school over having names that can be found on crayons.”

“Then we joined the circus and everyone stopped caring about that.” Azure grinned as well. “At least our names didn’t match our hair though, my poor little sister is named Ruby and her hair is even redder than mine and mine looks like it came out of a box.”

“True.” Olive said with a nod and a twist to their smile that implied laughter. “Poor girl really never lived that one down.”

“So why’d you guys join the circus anyway?” Laura asked, enjoying having someone around who spoke more than she did, it made it easy to concentrate on eating.

“We’re long.” Olive waved an arm out to the side. “And I’ve always liked walking on stilts.”

“And I got tired of boys complaining that I was taller than them.”

“Plus the food is good.”

“True, and the company is fab as well, present company absolutely included.” Both Olive and Azure winked; Laura wasn’t sure whether it was her or Clint they were winking at, but Clint gave them a lazy sort of grin that implied he thought he was the definition of fabulous company.

“What about you?”

“Me?” Laura asked tugging on her braid. “It was kind of an accident.”

“It’s because she’s a natural.” Azure said with a decisive nod and Olive nodded several times, shooting a sly grin at Clint.

“Plus he likes her.”

“True, and she looks damn good in that outfit.”

“Plus there’s the being able to deal with his moods.”

“And the hours.”

“And the sleeping in all sorts of odd places.”

“I don’t sleep in that many weird places.” Clint tried to defend himself and Laura started grinning.

“A tree.”

“Side of the road.”

“Right next to the fire.”

“Roof of your R.V.”

“Slumped half over a bench.”

“Leaning against a fire hydrant.”

Laura let out a laugh as Clint’s ears tinted themselves pink at the tips. Dinner was going to be fun now that these two were around.

—

When Clary heard Clint complain of wrist pain she’d all but put him on bed rest, eliminating their act from the list that night, much to Laura’s amusement and Clint’s annoyance. As soon as Clary had gone off Clint talked his way behind one of the counters at a game station rather than be left without something to do. Laura however was quite pleased, it left her free to explore the circus on her own, walking in casual clothes among the regular folk like she was one of them. None of them batted an eye and Laura enjoyed the anonymity.

She got some cotton candy from a food cart and a candy apple from Azure and nibbled both as she wandered. At first the noise and the colours were so much it was hard to notice anything else in detail but after a while the lights and colours faded to the background. Then she started noticing people and her fingers itched to pull out a sketchbook.

A mother and her two daughters walked by, the youngest tugging on her mother's arm with her hair tied back and stains around her mouth from whatever she’d been eating last, the older one slouching behind them and trying to look less impressed than she was with the carnival, and the mother herself wearing the harried but pleased look Laura distinctly remembered own her mother never having. They looked nice together, the kind of family Laura remembered herself wishing she’d had.

The next she saw were two teenage girls, giggling and leaning towards each other as they shared a stick of cotton candy so big she could barely see either of their heads behind it. They caught her looking, one glared and the other blushed, she just grinned and slipped around a corner.

A few minutes later she was nearly bowled over by a gaggle of giggling children whose accompanying adult was apologizing profusely to everyone they passed as they chased after the children. The first thing out of Laura’s mouth as the adult tossed an apology at her was thank you, much to the confusion of the adult but they didn’t hang around for an explanation. That was arguably for the better because Laura had no idea how to explain that she was thanking them for the lack of fear on the kids’ faces without explaining a reasonable chunk of her childhood, which no one really had time for.

After a while she found herself an empty seat in the area of the circus that seemed at first glance to be almost entirely seating. Once she’d sat though, she noticed the circus folk who moved throughout selling snacks and tickets, and the booths for both games and food that were scattered around the edges.

She relaxed into her chair and watched kids run between the tables like they were trying to trip the adults nearby. As she waited, she felt a part of herself that was always tense start to loosen, just a little, as she saw how few of the kids behaved like she would have. It was almost freeing for her watching how many of them were simply allowed to run off the excess sugar they’d had.

One of the adults raised their voice with just sharp enough of a tone that Laura felt her back straighten automatically. A child and a teen both looked up at the adult, the teen making a comment she couldn’t hear and the child clearly chattering at them, both of them relaxed and smiling. The parent rolled their eyes and held up their hand, all five fingers outstretched. Laura could hear the child’s thank you from the other side of the clearing as they raced off towards a game with the older one just steps behind.  
“It’s amazing what kids get away with these days isn’t it?” Someone Laura didn’t recognize slid into the seat next to her, the look on their face implying that they thought very little of kids these days.

“Yeah it is.” Laura said smiling out at the people ahead of her, watching the stranger out of the corner of her eye.

“All this fuss about treating them gently, in my day you got a smack when you did something wrong, not all this dithering.” He gestured to where a girl was kneeling in front of a toddler, clearly annoyed but talking to them.

“Can’t fix it if you don’t know what you’re doing wrong.” Laura commented, her voice carefully light.

“I turned out just fine.”

Laura sighed and turned to face the stranger fully. “I’d argue against that, as you just sat next to a random person you know nothing about and started telling them about how you support abuse.”

“I do not!”

“Maybe not, but that’s what it sounds like.” Laura kept the smile on her face out of sheer willpower. “You sound like exactly the kind of person who would have looked the other way when my parents yanked me towards them and hissed about dealing with me later, the kind of person who would have said something about different parenting styles.”

The stranger’s face quickly lost colour as she spoke and once she finished they stood up and left without another word. Laura sighed and put her chin on the table, really though if they didn’t want to hear it they should have gone elsewhere.

“Hey, pretty lady, want a flower?” Laura looked over to see a boy who couldn’t have been more than four holding a dandelion out towards her.

“Why thank you kind sir.” Laura took it with a smile and then leaned down so they were eye level. “Do you know what kind of flower it is?”

“A dandy lion!” He grinned, saying it like it was two separate words.

“Exactly correct!” She chuckled twirling it in her fingers. “It’s useful too, you can use it in salads and its roots are used in a variety of creams.”

“Like ice cream?”

“Not quite no.” Laughter filled her voice and she tucked it into her braid. “It would look very pretty on a bowl of ice cream though wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah!”

“I’m sorry, is he bothering you?” A pretty young girl ran over and scooped the boy up in her arms. “I just looked away for a minute and he took off.”

“The pretty lady was sad so I gave her a flower!” The boy tapped her shoulder for attention. “Like when papa brings you flowers!”

“He’s very sweet.” Laura shook her head and stood up. “Really he wasn’t bothering me at all, we were just talking about dandelions.”

“They’re useful in salads.” He said it with the most serious face Laura had ever seen on a toddler and she bit back a laugh.

“I suppose they are.” The girl nodded her head and smiled at Laura. “Thank you.”

“Just try not to make a habit of looking away.” She shrugged and waved at the boy. “It doesn’t take long for them to disappear.”

The girl smiled in a way that meant she recognized Laura’s tone, the one that said she was speaking from experience, but she didn’t pry. Instead she just told her boy to say bye to the pretty lady and they both disappeared off into the crowd.

Laura decided that was plenty enough socialization for her and headed back towards the closed off kitchen area to see if Cook needed any help prepping for dinner. Cook was thrilled for the help and in return spent the prep time telling Laura all sorts of stories about the early days of the circus, back when it was just Cook, Clary, and a handful of performers with none of the games and a quarter of the food. Cook did make sure to tell Laura that really the circus was still much smaller when it wasn’t summer, when they travelled further south and most of the circus folk went back to regular lives with jobs and school and sleep schedules. Laura was not entirely sure why those stories came out sounding more like assurances than stories.

—

One day in August, with the sun hanging heavy in the sky, the areas they drove through started looking familiar to Laura in a way nothing had yet. It wasn’t until they parked in a circle in the last field before the city that she realized why. They’d made it right on schedule, it was some time in early August and they’d arrived just outside of New York. She took a moment to stare at the skyline before getting ready, this would be her last performance, her last day with the circus, and she was going to enjoy it.

“Distracted today?” Clint stopped next to her a box of parts that would become a target in his arms.

“That’s New York.” Laura pointed towards the skyline.

“You’re home.” Clint said it quietly and Laura nodded unable to explain the barely there reasons it didn’t feel like a true statement. “Yeah, it’s about that time I suppose.”

“What time?”

“All the summer folk will leave in the next week or so.” He explained quietly. “Most of them here over the next few days, some of them in the next couple stops.”

He almost sounded sad but Laura was still searching for a way to apologize when he grinned.

“Now unless you want to stand around staring at each other ‘til Clary comes over annoyed that we ain’t moving fast enough.”

“Yeah yeah I’m coming.” Laura rolled her eyes and went to grab something to set up.

The rest of the day passed in a blur of set up and touch ups and before she knew it they were all grabbing quick snacks and suiting up. Something in the air felt different as the performers got ready, something Laura couldn’t quite place, but the performances were the best yet. It felt like both the longest and shortest night at the circus, and with what felt like almost no warning they were done and heading off stage while Clary went out to thank the audience and send them on their way to the games and food. Everyone swapped out performing costumes for either the ones they worn behind the booths or regular clothes for repair and packing depending on what they’d been assigned.

Laura and Clint both got repair and repack that evening so they changed into cut offs and old faded shirts and got to work. They talked while they worked trading barbs and laughter as they filed in holes or repainted targets got things back into shape for the next performance. In what felt like no time at all Laura realized they were running out of things to repack and she could hardly hear anything from the circus.

“It’s gotta be about time.” Clint nodded as he tucked the last box into a trailer. He pointed towards the far side of it all, the blocked off area that served as a kitchen and place to eat for the circus folk. “You coming?”

“To dinner?” Laura raised her eyebrow and Clint just grinned and made fists with his hands, shifting them back and forwards before pointing towards the blocked off area again. Laura grinned. “You’re on.”

Clint let out a whoop and took off like a shot, Laura right on his tail. She pulled ahead at the last second and twisted so she past around the corner before he did, grinning and sticking her tongue out at him before she noticed how bright the area was. Not that it was usually dark, there were fires and lights but there’s only so much that can be done when there's limited electricity and the sun has set. As she looked around she realized that she hadn’t helped set up this area this time, she’d always been directed away from it during set up actually. There was a half building of sorts, like someone had been intending to build a cabin and forgotten the front wall and all the innards and someone else had come along and stuck a huge stove along one wall. Lines of electric lights, like Christmas or fairy lights but brighter, were strung up with poles that moved away from the building in a half circle of sorts. The effect was beautiful, and the smell of whatever Cook was cooking was at least as good.

“This is the only property we stop on that’s actually owned by the circus.” Clint explained as she followed him towards the building where Cook, in all her tall and gangly beauty, was serving plates that dipped with the weight of the food. “Clary or Cook or someone inherited the property. It’s where we stop this time of year, every year. It’s the perfect place for a going away party for all the summer hires.”

“Party?”

“Yeah genius.” Clint bumped her shoulder with his. “We have a last big show and then a party, we hang around on the property for a few days but the circus shuts down. It’s the ever elusive time off, we mostly use it to upgrade and or repair anything major.”

Laura looked around, unable to verbalize the emotion inside her she just smiled at Clint instead. She tried to ignore the tears she could feel forming in the corners of her eyes.

“What you never got invited to parties as a kid?” He laughed right up until he realized she was shaking her head, then he watched her waiting for her to figure out the words.

It took her until after they’d gotten food from Cook and found a table near the edges of the light, where no one else had gotten to yet. She took a few deep breaths that looked to a less watchful eye than Clint’s like normal breaths. “It wasn’t just that I wasn’t invited, I got a few invitations, it was that my family didn’t do parties. Parties interfered with the things that were expected of us. Not that we didn’t attend or host them they just weren’t there for enjoyment… It was complicated.”

“Parties aren’t supposed to be complicated.” Clint leaned back in his chair, far enough she worried he might fall until he twisted and landed the front legs of his chair down again quite gently. “Parties are for fun.”

“Well, I know that now.” Laura rolled her eyes just as four people who sounded like two when they walked came over, dropping onto chairs and grinning at them.

“Aw, did Clint say something silly again?” Olive sighed towards Dakota and River. “You two back me up here yeah?”

“Or was it something obvious?” Dakota raised an eyebrow at Clint.

“Gross?” Azure piped up.

“Actually I was just saying that you four were going to show up and start up the weird twin talks again.” Clint grinned at the four of them. “You know the ones where y’all finish each other's sentences and forget to breath?”

“We do not!”

“Besides only D and R are twins.” Olive pointed out.

“The crayons are friends, they’re not even related.” River nodded dropping something green onto Dakota’s plate and snagging the potatoes off of it.

Laura watched as the four of them continued tossing gentle barbs at Clint and watching him deflect with jokes and toss his own barbs back. For the first time she could remember Laura almost didn’t want to go back to school.

She joined in again when someone made a comment about Clint’s smarts and he jerked a thumb at her, she was the smart one after all, going to uni and all that. It prompted the usual questions like where she was attending and what she was studying as well as complaints from both sets that she was leaving. The conversation shifted after that ranging from what the best colours were (Azure said blue, Olive said pink, Clint said purple, and the rest of them were rather neutral on the subject), to if anyone had plans for after the circus (Olive and Azure tossed around the idea of pilots, the twins were in Clint’s never leaving the circus camp, Laura shrugged), to what they would do in an apocalypse (Laura was the only one with a reasonable answer to that), and all the way back to the colour debate.

Then the music started playing and Clint grinned. “As much fun as it would be to explain in great detail why you two are wrong, I would much rather dance. Laura?”

Despite the late hour, or early hour depending on what way you looked at it, Laura stood up anyway and took Clint’s offered hand. “Sure.”

“I get to dance with you next.” Dakota grinned.

“It’s a fast song D, come dance now.” River laughed catching Dakota’s hand and hauling them up.

Olive and Azure raised eyebrows at each other before standing up and following the others. Soon all of them were dancing, teaching each other dances they’d learned at some point. At first they mostly stuck to dances that actually worked with the beat the songs that were playing had but soon it dissolved into any dance to any song and just making it work which Laura found honestly a lot more fun.

Their group was one of the last to turn in for the night and absolutely the last that was still dancing. The few other groups sat around tables sharing stories and drinks and laughing about how much energy kids had these days. By the time the six of them finally turned in the moon was dipping low in the sky.

Laura followed Clint back to the R.V. pausing on the step, despite the hour and the long day she wasn’t sure she wanted it to be tomorrow yet. She wasn’t sure if she was ready. Clint tapped on her shoulder and offered her a hand. “Trust me?”

“Haven’t given me a reason not to yet.” Laura smiled taking his hand and following him up onto the roof of the R.V., they settled onto the blanket that Clint always tossed up there the second they parked. As Laura watched Clint he pointed out across the field to where the sun was just beginning to show along the edges of what they could see.

“When you were looking up at the stars and telling stories did you ever imagine a future like this?” He asked the question quietly, like his voice alone might be enough to shatter the quiet sort of calm that had fallen around them.

Laura brought her index and middle finger together with her thumb. “No, watching the sun rise from the roof of an R.V. was never one of the futures I envisioned.”

“Me neither.” Clint chuckled looking up at the space where the sky was still dark and filled with stars. “It’s good though, this I mean, the circus and the people.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “It’s home, the only one I’ve ever had. Only real one anyway.”

Laura made a noise that could have meant anything and stared up at the stars, still trying to picture her future.

“What about you?” She could see him turning to look at her from the corner of her eyes. “What kind of futures did you plan?”

“School got me out of my parents place.” Laura said instead of answering either question he was asking. “I’ve always wanted to do something good, something that mattered.”

“Idealist.”

“Maybe.”

“It’s not a bad thing.” Clint laid back on the blanket, watching as the sky brightened and the stars faded.

“Depends on who you’re asking.” Laura laid next to him ignoring the part of her brain that noted how well they fit beside each other.

“So does everything.” He shrugged pointing up at the sky, the spot where the day and night merged together. “Everything depends on where you’re standing.”

“You should have been a philosopher instead of a sharp shooter.”

“Well it’s a good thing no one told me I had to pick one or the other.” His voice was tinged with laughter and Laura found herself smiling up at the stars as well.

“Yeah.” She turned her head to find him looking at her at well. “Yeah, that’s a good thing.”

Tomorrow she’d have to pack up her things, find an apartment, and start paying attention to the increasingly stressed sounding emails she’d been getting. Tomorrow she’d have to deal with the real world again. For now though she was happy to lay on the roof of an R.V. with a boy who’d never been taught that he couldn’t be both and talk as the sun remembered how to light up the world around them.


	4. It's New York kid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laura goes back to the city

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Endless thanks to Lindy (rooish on tumblr) for editing skills and enthusiasm

Laura could barely afford the little one bedroom apartment she got once she was back in New York, but it was only an hour train ride to school so it seemed worth it. There was a little locally owned grocery across the street run by a little old couple and their grandchildren that felt comfortable, almost familiar. They moved around in each other in that same way that the circus folk had, it spoke of trust and years of work to make it all look easy.

The first week back was a scramble. There were classes to sign up for, and books to buy, and checking in with her advisors to assure them she wasn’t dead she’d just been traveling, and they could assure her she could actually graduate. Though they did raise eyebrows when she switched her language class from French to ASL.

Once all the scramble was done and before classes had actually started there was a strange period of lull where she suddenly found herself with nothing to do. So she started sorting, putting books onto shelves and coffee mugs into cupboards. As she hung all her clothes up she came across the ridiculous outfit she’d worn during Clint’s act, and it suddenly hit her that they were all gone, that the circus had just been a summer thing. It sunk in, then, that it would eventually just be a story she told her kids about. One about a boy and a circus and a wild moment when she was young, and she sunk to the floor with the costume in her lap. She suddenly felt empty; more so when she realized no one would show up in a few minutes and laughingly pull her up, remind her that there was things to do and practice was a thing you had to do every day. Once she realized tears weren’t coming she stood up again, hung it in the closet behind fancy dresses she kept but rarely wore. That same emptiness pulsed when she found the set of knives, which she tucked inside a sock and into a drawer.

 Her clothes took the longest, the dishes she had didn’t even fill one of the cupboards, and the books barely filled the self she’d bought for them. So she did what she always had and threw herself into her studies, she’d read all the required textbooks by the time classes started. She reread the assigned parts as they came up, memorized anything the teacher mentioned might be important. Occasionally she’d wave at people she recognized and imagine turning down invites to coffee or study parties she would never get invited to. Sometimes at night she’d make tea and let herself wonder what might have happened if she hadn’t spent the last few years convincing these people she didn’t want anyone’s company.

Often she’d go to the little grocery store and just sit on the step and work on her papers. The gentleman who owned the shop had taken to handing her little bags of fruit that weren’t quite good enough to sell but were still fine to eat for a couple dollars a bag. He apparently didn’t even blink at the strange habits of reclusive university students.

One day when she was doing just that when a little girl came and stood in front of her with her hands planted firmly on her hips, all of three feet tall.

“I’m going to be a super hero when I grow up!” The girl proclaimed.

Laura looked around for a second to see if she was maybe talking to someone else before shrugging. “Well, it is New York kiddo, you can be whatever you want to be.”

“We’re going to be late for practice!” A rather harassed looking woman, probably the girl’s parent, called from half a block ahead.

“Just like Captain America!”

Laura leaned forward when the little girl continued to ignore her parent. “I bet Captain America was never late.”

“Oh!” The girl gasped and ran towards her parent, turning to wave to Laura as she went. “Bye pretty Lady!”

Laura waved as the girl was all but dragged around a corner.

“Dangerous work being a hero, kid should rethink her options.” The grocery’s owner held up a bag of fruit. “Most heroes don’t get to grow old.”

“Speaking from experience?” Laura traded him a few bills for the bag.

“I knew the Captain, he was a good kid. Course we were all kids back then.” He shrugged and pocketed the bills. “Only a handful of the heroes ever make it out of their wars.”

She glanced back in the direction the girl had gone in and nodded slowly. “Some of them end up okay though, and the regular world needs heroes as much as the wars do.”

“I suppose you’re right.” He nodded and waved as he headed back into the grocery.

Laura packed up her things and headed across to her apartment, she needed Wi-Fi for the next part of her paper anyway.

Almost two weeks later, nearly a month into classes, she got back to her apartment to find someone sitting outside her door. She sighed as she pulled her keys out of her pocket. “I don’t have a lighter and I don’t want whatever you’re selling.”

“What if I’m selling something really exciting?” They stood up and gave her an almost nervous smile and she stopped in her tracks as she saw who it was.

“Clint?” She nearly dropped her keys in surprise. “What, why- I thought you stayed with the circus?”

“Yeah…” Clint rubbed the back of his neck. “Turns out my act just ain’t the same anymore without you… So uh, did you want a roommate?”

“You helped me move in Clint, you know there’s only one bedroom.” Laura opened the door and gestured for Clint to follow her into the apartment. “Who let you into the building anyway?”

“Yeah, turns out there’s pretty much no security here?” Clint shrugged bouncing from his toes to his heels and back again. “I just followed someone in, I can go though… I mean if you like having your space and, really I should have never left the circus it’s the only, well I mean it’s still home…”

“You can have the couch.” Laura pointed at the lumpy thing she’d only picked up a few days ago. “If you want to stay I mean. Just don’t interrupt me when I’m studying, yeah?”

“Yes ma’am!” Clint snapped a sloppy salute and Laura rolled her eyes.

She headed towards her room to change into something more comfortable, but not before calling over her shoulder. “And I expect rent!”

Then it turned out Clint had watched pretty much not a single movie that had come out in the last decade so they spent the night watching her favourite shows. She only barely made it to class on time the next day, still in sweats and with a travel mug of Clint’s coffee instead of her tea. As good as it was at keeping her awake she really would have preferred her tea.

By the time she got home, late into the evening after three classes and four hours as a barista on campus, she was barely awake enough to drop her bag in the general vicinity of her desk and drop herself in the general vicinity of her bed.

“I made waffles!” Clint’s cheerful voice woke her up the next morning, or she assumed it was the next morning, in any case her phone was beeping it’s ‘I’m dying plug me in’ noises at her. As she did so it flashed a cheerful [06:55] at her and she let out a groan. Clint poked his head in her doorway and grinned. “Oh good you’re awake, there’s waffles.”

“I have to leave for class in twenty minutes.” Laura muttered as she lurched towards the bathroom, her mouth felt like a desert had crawled inside it while she was sleeping.

“I’ll make yours to go then!” Clint grinned. “And tea this time, yeah? I imagine you didn’t enjoy my coffee very much.”

“Ideally, tea, yes.” Laura nodded silently cursing herself for taking classes at nine am in the fuckin’ morning. Way too early for a class, honestly. By the time she was dressed Clint had a travel mug and a takeout box set up on the counter and was sitting on the couch with a laptop she assumed was his. She leaned on her doorway and watched him for a moment. “What are you doing?”

“Helping.” He pointed towards the travel mug. “Also looking for a job, you said you wanted me to help with rent. My savings from the circus won’t last forever.”

“I can’t imagine you working in a normal job.” She laughed pulling her bag onto her back before picking up the travel mug and box. “They don’t allow weapons at most of them.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” He smirked up at her before looking back down at the laptop. “It’s been twenty five minutes since you said you had to leave in twenty.”

“Shit.” Laura was out the door before Clint had even finished laughing.

She made it to her class on time regardless, and then to work after that. She hummed as she made people’s extremely complicated coffee orders and passed them across the counter. It wasn’t exactly a better day than usual, people complained and handed back coffees and demanded she remake them because ‘it doesn’t usually taste like this’. The day seemed to pass faster than usual though, and soon she and one of the girls she often overlapped with were cleaning up the tables and counters from the residue of the lunch rush.

“Did you get some last night or something?” The girl leaned against the counter and raised her eyebrows at Laura.

“Hmm?” Laura looked at her, trying to determine what exactly the question meant.

“You seem happier today is all.” She shrugged waving her cloth around vaguely. “You’ve usually got a black cloud over your head but you're all smiles and annoyingly catchy humming today.”

“Ah,” Laura nodded looking up at the ceiling for a second trying to think of an explanation that wouldn’t be considered over sharing. “I got waffles this morning.”

“Alright Laura I’m here, you’re off. Go home!” Elizabeth, who insisted on being called Lizzy for no reason Laura had been able to figure out despite having worked with her for years, skidded into the cafe waving her hands in Laura direction.

“She’s off alright.” The other girl rolled her eyes and went back to cleaning the counter.

Laura wasn’t particularly bothered by the comment, she’d figured out years ago that she didn’t make sense to most people.


	5. Civilians

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone notices Clint and it's not just Laura

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always many thanks to Lindy (rooish on tumblr) for editing skills!

“Turns out knowing a lot about random weapons is good for at least one job.” Clint announced about a week and a half after he’d moved in with her. Of all the things she’d possibly expected him to say as she walked through the door after classes, that was not high on the list. Which was quite possibly why she just stood and stared at him instead of answering, luckily he took that as his cue to elaborate. “I got a job at an army surplus store, they said I’d mostly be working with the knives and arrows and such anyway so it’s ideal.”

“I suppose that works.” Laura nodded and flopped onto the couch next to him. “I’m so glad it’s the weekend.”

“Don’t you still work on the weekend?”

“Yes but unlike normal cafes, the on campus one I work at is slower on weekends than weekdays.” Laura’s eyes were half closed and her limbs felt like they’d suddenly been lined with lead.

“Late night last night?”

“Studying.” Laura nodded, or tried to nod, despite her best efforts she found herself falling asleep. Then she felt the weight of a blanket and the battle was lost as she fell asleep.

There was a warm sort of smell in the apartment when Laura woke up, the crick in her neck making it clear that sleeping in a sitting position on the couch wasn’t optimal.

“So I gotta ask.” Clint was leaning on the counter when she turned to look at him. “Are you related to the guy at the grocery? Because you don’t look even remotely the same but when I went to buy stew ingredients he gave me a bag of fruit, for you, and said that I better take good care of his girl.”

“Turns out if you spend most days sitting on someone’s doorstep they get attached.” Laura shook her head as she stretched. “Did you say stew?”

“Yeah, it’s just about ready.” Clint nodded gesturing at the pot with the spoon she just realized he was holding.

“You can cook?”

“I feel like I should be offended by that.” Clint frowned for a second before deciding it was worth it. “Cook taught me how when I was just a kid in the circus, before I learned to shoot like I do.”

“Smells good.” Laura smiled as she got bowls out of the cupboard, all two of the bowls she owned actually.

“Thanks,” Clint handed her the ladle with an over-elaborate bow. “After you my lady.”

Laura couldn’t help the laugh that fell out of her as she ladled stew into both bowls and handed Clint his.

 

—

 

“You have to go to bed Laura, you’ve got class early tomorrow morning.” Clint was frowning at her but Laura ignored him, focusing instead on the chapter she was currently trying to study, or cram rather as the test was tomorrow. “Not sleeping is only going to make everything worse.”

“You don’t know shit.” Laura muttered reading the paragraph again as the words started to blur together. “I’ve done this for years and I’m just fine.”

“You look like shit warmed over.” Clint muttered, annoyance colouring his tone. “These grades don’t mean-”

“These grades mean everything.” Laura snapped at him and then recoiled as she heard how it sounded, how she sounded. “I’m just, nothing else will matter if I can’t, if I-”

She stopped speaking as Clint touched her hand gently, tugging it off her textbook when she didn’t pull away. “Come on Laura, go to bed.”

She shook her head but stood as Clint pulled her away from her desk. Laura wasn’t sure exactly what it was she was shaking her head at but once she was up it was easy enough to get changed and crawl into bed, even once Clint had stopped leading her and had gone back to the couch. She stood in the doorway for a second staring at where he was curled on the couch with his back to her. Unsure of how to thank him, or if she should, or if it would just be weird, she just went to bed instead.

The next day she woke up early, groggy and half asleep but her mug of tea and a little lunch box with eggs, bacon, and toast were sitting on the counter despite Clint being still very asleep on the couch. It made her pause for a moment and wonder if his insomnia wasn’t honestly just as bad as hers some nights. It made her wonder for a moment about his past he was so vague about. Then her alarm reminding her that she needed to leave the house went off. She stuffed her textbooks into her bag and dashed out with the lunch box and tea in hand to eat while she scanned her notes before the exam.

When she got home, Clint was out and the note on the fridge said he was at work until late. She’d stopped at the grocery on the way home though so she still made enough curry for both of them. She left the portion for him in the fridge with an apology on the sticky note. Then she headed to bed, she had class tomorrow even if she was very ready for this semester to be over. At least her class tomorrow wasn’t until the afternoon.

“Good morning sunshine.” Clint’s voice greeted her when she dragged herself into the kitchen sometime during that time of day that wasn’t quite morning but wasn’t yet afternoon.

“You’re too awake.” She mumbled, or tried to, she doubted it sounded like real words.

“Tea’s on the counter.” Clint’s smile looked almost gentle, right up until he smirked and gestured to her hair. “Love the new hairstyle, straight up in the air suits you.”

“Fuck off.” Laura picked up her tea and breathed in the smell of it for a few minutes before she sipped it. Then she frowned as a thought occurred to her. “How do you know? You’ve been making me tea for weeks, how did you get it right immediately.”

“In case you forgot the living space in the van we had in the circus wasn’t exactly large.” Clint laughed leaning over the back of the couch to watch her. “I saw you make your tea a handful of times a day for nearly three months.”

“Huh,” She stared at the cup thoughtfully. “Didn’t realize you were paying attention.”

He nodded a few times. “S’okay, most people don’t.”

“That’s a talent.” Laura remarked moving to sit next to him on the couch, not really paying attention to whatever he was watching on his laptop currently. “You should nurture it.”

“Paying attention without people noticing?” He let out a noise that might have been a snort.

“Yeah, you could be a spy.” She chuckled as the warmth of the tea seeped into her hands. “Learn all sorts of info while people write you off as the goof with the bow who didn’t even complete high school.”

“I barely completed elementary, and I can pretend that I can’t read their lips.” Clint corrected bumping her shoulder. “No one would ever suspect me.”

“Exactly.” She leaned into him, pleased to find that he was still a solid sort of warmth, and just a little unsure as to why that came as a surprise. So she closed her eyes and focused on breathing instead.

They sat in the quiet for a while, until whatever Clint was watching started playing credits music, and Laura almost felt like sleeping again. When Clint spoke she was half convinced she’d dreamed his voice. “You didn’t have to apologize, for the other night I mean, for getting stuck.”

“What?” She blinked, pulling back a little to look at him.

“You left an apology on the curry, you didn’t have anything to apologize for.” Clint shrugged clearly trying not to look away as she watched him. “Everyone gets stuck sometimes.”

“They really don’t, not like I do.” Laura glanced down for a moment. “It’s like I can’t convince my brain to do what I know I should be doing.”

Clint was quiet for a moment, just watching her, like he was trying to decide what words to use. “Cook used to get stuck chopping things up for stew. She said it was like nothing was ever quite the right size. The acrobats, Dakota and River, they’d get stuck for days playing with gears and bolts until they’d fixed whatever problem the rest of us could never quite see. A bunch of the others would get stuck too, in their brains, or in a routine, or if you disturbed their routines. We all just found ways around it or did our best to help, pass off tasks that others just couldn’t do or whatever.”

Laura hadn’t even noticed that she was clenching her fists until Clint gently pried them apart, brushed his thumb over the little half-moon lines her nails had left on her palms. She stared at her hands and his for a minute unsure of how to explain the feeling like something was untying itself in her. Then her alarm went off and she swore softly. “I have to, uh, class.”

“Yeah, go be a genius.” Clint patted her knee and picked up his laptop from the couch.

She stopped just before rushing out the door, just long enough to tack a sticky note beside the door with a simple ‘thank you’ written on it.

 

—

 

“So grocery store guy? Do you know his name?” The way Clint says it was so casual it felt faked, possibly was faked. Laura was pretty sure she’s figured out the difference. “Or how the kids who work for him are related to him?”

She took a break from the essay she was currently writing to turn around and look at him. Though her intention had been to say that yes of course she did, once she’d turned around her mind was drawing a blank. The longer it took for her to answer the more her insides twisted. It felt like a personal failure. “Shit.”

“Really?” Clint’s eyebrows rose to meet the place where his bangs had gotten too long. “I thought you just weren’t telling me.”

“I’ll be right back.” Laura took two seconds to grab a hoodie and her keys before bolting out the door, trying to ignore the stifled laughter she could hear behind her.

She skidded to a halt just outside of the grocery and tried to walk in like she hadn’t just run down the stairs of her apartment building. Once in the grocery store it occurred to her that other customers existed as he was currently talking to one. So instead of walking up and asking him questions she wandered around the store and looked at food she didn’t need. She ended up with a pack of candy, a large bottle of pop, and a box of cake mix anyway. His other customer stormed off in huff and Laura went up to him trying to think of a clever way to ask his name.

“I’ve never asked your, what’s your name anyway?” The words blurted out of her mouth when she tried to casually ask her question.

Much to her dismay he just started laughing. “Oh little one, you didn’t need to get so fussed over it. I’m Jack.”

“What about the kids? The one’s who work here during the week?”

“My niece Angelica and my grandson Eric, my daughter Litty works the checkout.” He pointed over to her and smiled at Laura. “And the kids are both nearly adults, Eric is eighteen and Angelica is nearly twenty now.”

“Oh…” Laura frowned at the ground for a minute. “Do you always help random uni students?”

“When I can, yes.” He nodded. “You in particular seemed like you need to hear a kind word or two; most students come in here in packs or chattering about friends. You just sat on the step and scribbled away in your notebooks.”

“Ah, sorry.” Laura rubbed the back of her neck.

“No need to apologize, you’re a nice girl.” He grinned and patted her head. “Plus, you help me get rid of the old fruit without tossing it away. Now go pay for your things and run back home. I imagine your boyfriend is a little confused.”

“He’s not, we’re not.” Laura rolled her eyes and headed towards the counter. “He’s probably still laughing about the whole thing.”

“He seems nice.” Litty smiled as Laura handed over her few items. “That roommate of yours, he sees more than he lets on.”

“Yeah, he really does.” Laura nodded paying for her items and heading back to the apartment.

As expected Clint was still chuckling to himself when she got back, and broke into even more laughter when he saw the odd assortment of things she’d purchased.

“Yeah, okay, shut up.” Laura rolled her eyes and settled next to him on the couch once everything was put away. “His name is Jack and he helped me because I seemed like I could use help.”

“Well, he’s right about that.” Clint laughed, then winced as she hit his arm.Laura let out a giggle and suddenly they were both laughing at the whole ridiculous thing.

 

—

 

Laura woke up shaking and sweating with a sharp sort of warmth around her neck but the actual nightmare, the plot and the people of it, was already fading. All she remembered of it was fear and fighting and dying. Then she realized there was residual warmth on her shoulder from someone shaking her and she looked over to see Clint standing beside the bed. He was staring at her with that look on his face like he was suddenly not sure who the deaf one in the apartment was really, but this time there was something else in his eyes, some concern or worry and she realized she must have woken him up. She sat up, already apologizing out of reflex. “Sorry, sorry I didn’t mean to wake y-”

“It's fine, you didn’t.” He waved away her apology and leaned in, close enough that he could see her face even in the dim light. “Are you alright?”

“A nightmare, it’s nothing.” She tried to wave it off but she could still feel something on her neck and she choked on the last word, shaking her head instead.

“Didn’t sound like nothing.” Clint said, he looked like he tried for a smile but didn’t quite make it. “Sure you don’t want anything? Some water, a snack, another blanket?”

“We don’t own any other blankets, and no I won’t take yours.” Laura cut him off as soon as he opened his mouth.

“Well, fine then.” Clint rolled his eyes and held up his hands in defeat. He stood for a moment but when she didn’t say anything he turned to leave her room.

He’d barely taken half a step away when Laura felt a ball of anxiety jump in her stomach and she was certain if he left and she laid down again she’d slip right back into the same nightmare again. As soon as she thought it her hand shot out and she wrapped her fingers loosely around his wrist. “Stay. Please.”

He looked down at her hand, as though it were a question he wasn’t sure he understood, but he took the half a step back towards her bed and her anxiety settled a little. When she scooted over and tugged on his hand it seemed to click for him and he settled beside her with a gentle smile. “So I guess I wasn’t part of your nightmare then?”

That at least startled a laugh out of her. “Wouldn’t know, I hardly remember it. Just don’t want it to happen again tonight.”

“At least you have tomorrow off.” Clint chuckled, relaxing into the bed.

“Yeah.” She nodded and closed her eyes, drifting back to sleep almost immediately.

Either her anxiety was full of it, or having Clint’s warmth beside her worked because the rest of the night passed with the kind of deep dreamless sleep she rarely got to experience. Unfortunately this also meant that she woke up early, or rather at her usual time but naturally, not because her alarm was shrilly demanding she wake up. This meant she woke up rested, warm, and with the first rays of sunrise peeking through her window to land softly in Clint’s hair. Which reminded her that it was Clint pressed up against her with his forehead pressed gently against her shoulder. Something about the whole thing made her heart jump and she scrambled out of bed before she had a chance to think about what exactly that might mean.

Once in the bathroom she spent the next twenty minutes or so telling herself that it had been nothing, or just friendship, a trick of the sunrise maybe. In between bouts of that she got ready for the day; by the time she left the bathroom Clint was up and in the kitchen. The sun though the windows turned the whole kitchen golden and drew her attention back to Clint. He was facing the counter as he stirred something in a bowl and for the first time since he’d moved in she was awake enough while he was cooking to see the way his muscles work. It helped that he wasn’t wearing a shirt, and that his body didn’t seem to realize there was supposed to be a layer of fat between the muscle and his skin. Then he took a step to the side and she looked away, her face heating up as she realized she’d been staring.

She tried to bury herself in her studies, mostly because she had midterms coming up and it was her final term but also partly to avoid thinking about the way her heart twisted when Clint looked at her these days. It only worked for the first part. For the second she just kept getting distracted, he always made sure her tea was full when she was home and he packed breakfast or lunch for her when she left. Sometimes she’d look up from her books and he’d be working out or glaring at a book like it had personally offended him and she had to force herself to look away, to not stare. There are days when she took her tea and moved to her room, to avoid it all.

This whole avoidance plan might have even worked if it wasn’t for the fact that it was Clint and they were friends and she didn’t want to lose that over this new habit her heart had picked up of doing gymnastics almost constantly. So he still touched her arm when they went out and he wanted to point something out to her or be sure she was paying attention. So she still leaned into him when they sat on the couch and watched a movie. It was his smile that killed her though, or his laugh maybe, or the way he lit up whenever she managed to make a joke. Maybe though it was that the way he laughed for her was different then the way he laughed outside of the apartment, around other people.

After her midterms ended, she tried a different tactic. Clearly pretending she still felt the same about Clint wasn’t working. Which was how she found herself standing in front of the mirror while he was out at work. She stared herself down with her most serious expression, one she reserved usually for things like tests or the possibility of failure. “So. You like the boy, you’ve liked people before. Just take a deep breath and try not to fuck everything up alright? Staying friends is more important than this.”

She nodded at herself before heading back to the kitchen and pulling out the stew chunks she’d bought on the way home. Clint was working late and for the first time in ages she didn’t have a test or a report due for almost three days so she had both the time and energy to make a proper meal. Plus she’d been craving stew for about a month now. She set about cutting the chunks into closer to bite sized pieces and cooking some seasoning into them before adding soup stock and water and pulling veggies out to cut them up.

“Onions and carrots and potatoes, oh my.” Laura hummed under her breath while she chopped everything into bite sized pieces and added it into the pot. There would absolutely be enough leftovers to freeze and eat for the next few days. Once the veggies were in she added seasonings and just a tiny pinch of cinnamon. With everything in the pot there wasn’t much left to do so Laura just left it to simmer on the stove and turned a random show on her laptop.

“Something smells good.” Clint’s voice beside her had Laura nearly jumping out of her skin.

“Why don’t you make any noise?!” Laura spun around to glare at him but as it turned out Clint was close enough behind her that their noses were almost touching.

Clint shrugged and grinned at her. “I learned to walk quietly.”

“You’re the worst.” Laura dropped her chin onto the back of couch and frowned at him.

“Yup.” He bumped her forehead with his before standing up properly and heading to the kitchen. “Should we eat?”

“Yeah, should be ready soon.” Laura said it loud enough she knew he’d still hear her despite her burying her face in one of the cushions.

“Coming?” There was a note that almost sounded like worry in his voice and Laura frowned into the cushion before heading to the kitchen, she hadn’t intended to make him worry. She had an apology ready, but as she got into the kitchen he beat her to the punch. “I’m sorry, you’ve been twitchy lately and I don’t know what I did wrong or if I’m getting too much into your space but I’m sorry, if you could just tell me so I could stop doing whatever it is?”

“I’m-it’s not you, it’s really not.” Laura shook her head holding her arms at her sides to stop herself from wrapping them around herself. “It’s me, you’re fantastic really, you even make breakfast nearly every day you’re wonderful…”

“Well, Laura, if I didn’t know you better I’d say you had a crush on little old me.” Clint leaned against the counter, laughter clear in his voice.

“Don’t let it inflate your ego too much.” Laura muttered, her eyes dropping to the ground even as she kept her face up enough that he could read her lips.

There were a few minutes of silence in which Laura managed to glance up and see Clint looking more than a little star struck. When she met his eyes he seemed to remember how to speak, at least a little. “Really?”

“It’s your fault.” Laura crossed her arm attempting to glare at him. “You’re so consistently, well you. All... making things seem better with your jokes and always looking out for me. Plus you cook.”

“I... really? Me?” Clint looked almost afraid, like he wasn’t sure if he should be making a joke of the whole thing or not.

“Yeah.” Laura stepped forwards so they were only an arm’s length apart. “I’m sorry, I know I’m all twitchy about it and if it makes you uncomfortable or-”

“No, no.” Clint said it with slightly more force the second time and he reached out to touch her cheek gently, slowly enough she could step back easily if she wanted to. “Sure you don’t want someone better?”

“Like who?” Laura raised an eyebrow, setting aside the fact that Clint was one of the sweetest people she’d ever met she didn’t exactly know that many people.

“Like anyone.” He looked down with a shrug his hand dropping away from her cheek. “Laura I have a grade eight education at best. You’re so smart and... there’s no way I can keep up in a proper conversation.”

“If I wanted someone highly educated and boring I would have stayed with my parents.” She bumped her forehead against his lightly, more or less forcing him to look at her again. Then she reached out and took the hand he had dropped away from her cheek, lacing her fingers through his. “You cook for me all the time, you’ve never once made me feel like an idiot for my nightmares or getting stuck, and you make me laugh.”

“But-”

“I’m done complimenting you, are you going to kiss me or not?” Laura asked, her eyebrows raised again as she waited to see what he’d do. She didn’t have to wait more than a second or two before he leaned in, his lips were soft and gentle against hers and as he pulled away she started giggling. “You’ve been swiping my chapstick again haven’t you?”

“Maybe.” His smile was soft as he rested his forehead against hers.

Before she could respond she heard a hissing and bubbling noise and realized the stew had decided this was a good time to bubble over. “Shit.”

“I got it.” Clint pressed a kiss to her forehead before stepping towards the stove to deal with the stew. Within minutes he’d pulled it from the hot spot and ladled out a bowl for each of them. Laura leaned against the counter a soft smile refusing to leave her face. They’d have to have a talk, possibly several, about this whole thing later. But for now, she was just going to enjoy the way he kept looking at her like he couldn’t believe his luck.

 

—

 

The next few weeks passed in a blur of the city getting truly cold as winter settled in like it intended to stay. First sleet and then snow blew through turning the city to slush and muck as they approached Christmas. Store playlists got ridiculous, pumpkin spice lattes were replaced with gingerbread ones, and Clint insisted that they hang colourful lights around the apartment and on the balcony. Laura drew the line at a full sized tree though, she hadn’t had one since she left her parents and she didn’t see the need for one now. Clint got a tiny one that he put on the kitchen table. He put strings of popcorn and tinsel on it.

Then two days before Christmas there was a blizzard and Christmas Eve the sun rose on a city so blanketed in snow most people were thrilled that vacations had started already. Laura was watching the sun rise from the little bench they’d put out on the balcony where she was curled up in a blanket and holding a mug of tea when she heard the door open and looked over about to apologize for stealing the warmer blanket off of their bed. Then she saw what Clint was wearing as he stepped out into the snow. His outfit consisted of winter boots, at least three sweaters, and shorts.

“Nightmares again?” He asked but she was laughing too hard at his fashion statement to do more than shake her head in response. He rolled his eyes and waited for her to finish.

She took a few deep breaths to get herself back under control before she managed a response. “Just couldn’t sleep, didn’t want to wake you.”

“Enjoying the sunrise?” He settled beside her and she held out some of the blanket so he could wrap it around his shoulders.

“Mhmm, the snow is pretty before it gets all driven through.” She said and he nodded. They settled against each other again to watch the sun.

After what could have been anywhere between five minutes and an hour Clint shifted slightly and grinned at Laura. “Let’s go for a walk.”

“I’ll have to get dressed.” Laura mumbled and curled further into the blanket.

“I’ll make breakfast.” Clint’s voice took on a wheedling tone and Laura rolled her eyes.

“Fine go, I’ll go put pants on.” Laura stood up, taking the blanket with her. Clint jumped up and opened the door with a bow so over exuberant he almost knocked himself over. She couldn’t help the laugh that escaped her as she stepped into the apartment and kicked her flats off. She changed quickly into a warm pair of sweats and a tank top.

“Waffles.” Clint said it with a grin as he put plates down on the counter with said waffles on them. “Kettle is on for tea and coffee, it’ll boil in a sec.”

“Use the travel mugs, we might as well bring the warm drinks with us.” Laura pointed out as she set about putting butter and syrup on her waffles.

In less time that one might have thought it would take, they’d both demolished their waffles and tucked themselves into winter jackets and boots. It was still early enough as they left the apartment that it felt like they were the only ones in the entire city as they walked towards the nearest park.

 As they walked, the sun rose to a height more reasonable for being awake, and the few clouds that were left over from the storm disappeared. Their conversation dipped through a dozen topics, what groceries they needed, if they should start a garden on the balcony that spring, how strange it was for there to be near silence in their city, and why they didn’t go out to the park more often.

Just as they entered the part of the path that meandered through a wooded area they heard a scream, or the beginning of a scream rather as it was cut off part way through. They both went silent and Laura pointing in the direction the scream had come from, further into the trees there were two larger shapes that had backed a smaller one against a tree. Laura didn’t even think, just pulled the knife she kept in her boot out and tossed it. It embedded itself in the trunk of the tree, well about the smaller one but it had gotten close enough to one of the larger ones that they had to have felt a breeze. As they turned towards her she realized she’d actually drawn blood along their cheek. Then an arrow landed next to her knife and she looked over to see that Clint had pulled out a bow from gods only knew where.

She stepped to the side and disappeared behind a tree as the two larger ones focused on Clint and his arrows, deciding whether it was worth fighting him no doubt. They stepped away from the smaller one and she darted over and took their arm. “Come with me.”

They looked at her with a mix of fear and hope and she must have looked like the better option because they followed her a dozen feet away into the trees and sat when she pointed at a tree large enough to block them from view. They glanced back as though they could look through the trunk. “Will he kill them?”

“Probably not, if they push it to a proper fight he’ll knock them out.” She knelt in front of them. “I’m Laura, are you alright?”

“Shame, they’re assholes. I’m Erin, I thought it was cold enough out that I could go for a walk without worrying.” They shot another glare over their shoulder. “Clearly I was wrong.”

“So, who’d you piss off to end up worried to go for walks?” Laura raised an eyebrow.

“A lot of people. Turns out if you’re a girl and you try to change things that’ll happen.” She shrugged a wry looking grin on her face. “Thanks for the hand though, wasn’t looking forwards to explaining to the hospital why I needed stitches again so soon.”

“We were out anyway.”

“They’re out cold.” Clint’s voice from nearby had Laura standing up and smiling as he came into view.

“Good, we should get out of here and call it in to someone then.” Laura offered Erin a hand up. “Unless you want to talk to the authorities you should scram.”

“You’re staying to talk to them.” She raised an eyebrow.

“Anonymous tip lines get calls about disturbances all the time.” Laura shrugged. “Hardly requires actual witnesses.”

Erin laughed before taking off and Laura took Clint’s hand as they headed off in the opposite direction, she let him lead as she called the tip line. Without really thinking about it she kept the call under two minutes.

“Here’s your knife.” Clint handed it to her as she hung up, a small frown on his face. “You always have that with you?”

“I like it.” She smiled at it, one of her favourites from the set she’d gotten from the circus, then she tucked it into her boot. “And you’re hardly one to talk.”

“What?”

“You carry around a bow!” Laughter spilled out of her at the sentence and she couldn’t decide if it was the last of the adrenaline or the lack of sleep that made it so funny. “And arrows, where do you even keep them?”

“The bow is collapsible.” Clint rubbed at the back of his neck looking almost sheepish. “The arrows I keep in a pocket I added to the inside of my coat.”

“You’re ridiculous.” Laura leaned into him and he let go of her hand in favour of wrapping an arm around her waist instead.

They walked the rest of the way home in silence and the next couple days passed in a flurry of presents, food, and laughter. Laura got Clint a new quiver, one made of brown leather that was more practical than the one he had from the circus, it caused a lot more laughter than had been intended originally. He got her a new hat and a bag that had two large compartments, one for a laptop and one for books.

A few days before the start of the new semester there was a knock on their door and they exchanged confused glances, they knew very few people and none of them knew where they lived.

Laura opened the door and frowned at the man who stood on the other side. He was large, with dark skin and an eye patch, but it was the way he held himself that made her frown. He held himself like he knew the secrets of the universe but he doubted you’d be worth telling.

“Can we help you?” Clint came to stand beside her when Laura didn’t say anything.

“You must be Mr. Barton, I’d like a word with you.” He looked at Laura again like he was confused as to why she was there. “In private.”

“Whatever you want to say to me you can say to Laura.” Clint frowned at the man. “Who are you anyway?”

“Agent Fury, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. and based on your performance on Christmas Eve I think you’re exactly the kind of agent we want.” Fury nodded as though he was agreeing with himself, or like he wanted them to nod as well Laura couldn’t tell. “Took down two goons who’d been sent after a young girl without any thought to your own safety.”

“Could you speak a little slower? I must be having trouble reading your lips, I could swear you just said I saved someone on Christmas Eve.” Clint shook his head and fiddled with his hearing aids for a second. Laura kept the grin off her face easily, she was still annoyed with this Fury guy after all. “All I did on Christmas Eve was go for a walk with my partner.”

“Barely drew a drop of blood from either of them, just the knife cut across one of their faces. I assume that was to get their attention.” Fury said, completely ignoring Clint pretending to misunderstand.

“That wasn’t-” He started but Laura elbowed him before he could finish the sentence. He frowned at her but she just shook her head and he turned back to Fury, who was now grinning like they’d fallen for a trap he’d planted. “So I saved the kid what are you here for? People get saved all the time.”

“Not like that.” He shook his head. “I’d like to offer you a position in S.H.I.E.L.D. you’ll still have to go through regular training of course but I can put you in regardless of your technical qualification.”

“I have a job.” Clint frowned at him as Laura thought about it. She’d heard of S.H.I.E.L.D. of course, most kids born with the status she’d had had heard of them. For an organization that had been intended to be a secret they were honestly a very bad at staying that way. These days they even had academies, abet extremely hard to get into academies.

“If you want him you’ll have to take me too.” Laura said, cutting off whatever Fury had been saying to try and convince Clint to join.

“Now girly, you might be plenty tough for a civilian but I can’t by pass regular rules for just anyone.” Fury shook his head like she was a child who’d asked for candy before bedtime and Laura could feel Clint bristle but she just put her hand on his arm.

“I think you’re misunderstanding me here, Fury.” Laura took a step forwards, forcing Fury to stand toe to toe with her or step back, he stepped back. “I am more than qualified for your little secret ops organization, in fact I spent most of my youth being groomed for it. You will put me in the training class with Clint, I don’t care how you do it or how you explain it to your supervisors.”

Fury’s eyes narrowed as she spoke, by the time she was done he was nearly glaring at her. “You’re just a civilian.”

“For all intents and purposes yes.” Laura nodded before stepping back to stand beside Clint. “But would you have stepped away from just a civilian?”

“Fine.” Fury handed her a stack of papers. “That’s the information you need to know. Next class of training starts May first, both of you better be there.”

“Good, just enough time to finish my degree.” Laura smiled politely at him before closing the door in his face. Once the sound of footsteps faded she rolled her eyes and turned to look at Clint. “You would get credit for my knife throw.”

“I tried to explain.” He rubbed the back of his neck looking in genuine confusion at their door. “What did you mean, about being groomed as a kid?”

Laura sighed and looked up at the roof. “It was part of my parents plan, get me a nice normal boy, a degree and a masters in a field that would get me into S.H.I.E.L.D but wouldn’t draw too much attention to me, and I didn’t want that. Not the way they wanted it to be.”

“You know what S.H.I.E.L.D. is?” Clint looked at her.

“It was intended to be a secret, now it’s just classified. Their job is to protect the world from threats most organizations aren’t equipped to handle.” Laura shrugged. “It was Captain America’s group that started it, sort of anyway.”

“Great.” Clint rubbed his head. “So guess I’m going to be a spy after all.”

“Apparently yes.” Laura sighed as they both sank onto the couch. She leaned against his shoulder and he put his arm around her almost automatically. Then it hit her that she’d done exactly what her parents had wanted her to but for entirely different reasons. “Funny how things turn out.”


	6. Unexpected Developments

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laura and Clint join S.H.I.E.L.D., meet some old friends, and make some new ones.

Despite the deadline of May first, the next few months seemed easy. Laura had finished the hardest classes in her last semester so this one felt like a breeze; most of her classes being taught by profs she already knew and liked. Clint was enjoying his job even more now that he knew he’d be giving them his notice sooner rather than later. Clint still made breakfast, or sometimes it was closer to lunch if neither of them had a morning class or shift, and Laura usually made dinner. They still helped each other work around issues. Honestly, the only real difference in the new semester was that now they spent a lot more of their movie nights paying more attention to each other than to the movie- unless it was one of Laura’s favourite movies. Clint quickly learned to not put those on unless he actually intended to watch them.

The months flew past and one day Laura looked up and realized that finals were almost over and May first was right around the corner. She was going to have to have a conversation with Clint soon, about a couple different things. So she did what she always did when she was nervous and started cooking. By the time he was home from work she’d not only made stew, rice, and fresh rolls but she’d also made whipped garlic butter for the rolls.

“Did you win the lottery or something?” Clint asked when he walked through the door and saw the amount of cooking she’d done. “Or was this nerves? Did someone die?”

“We need to talk about S.H.I.E.L.D.” Laura said as she ladled stew into bowls for them. The rice, rolls, and butter she’d already set out on the table. “I mean we’re still going, I don’t mean we shouldn’t join, we just need to talk about it.”

“I’m assuming you have a list?” Clint smiled as he took his bowl from her and headed for the table.

“Of sorts yes.” She put her bowl down on the table and sat down, feeling a little sheepish as she realized she probably hadn’t needed to be quite as nervous about this whole thing as she had been.

“Alright, what’s first?” Clint asked before he started eating.

“Well first off I wasn’t the only kid whose parent planned on them becoming a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.” Laura said picking up a roll and systematically tearing it apart. “We’ll probably meet a lot of people who knew me when I was a kid, when I had still went by Lauretta, the name my parents picked out for me.”

“Fancy.”

“They were.” Laura nodded. “So were the other kids. They’ll probably have their own clique in the training groups, kids who were planning on joining since infancy.”

“Okay so there will be pretentious kids who knew you when you had a fancy name.” Clint nodded using the bits of the roll she dropped on the table to soak up the last dregs of his stew. “I’m guessing these aren’t people you want to be friends with?”

“No, and they’ll talk.” Laura looked down at the table. “Just, if they tell you anything remember they’re talking about a much younger and more sheltered me.”

“Will do.”

“Alright, that’s that then uh.” Laura looked from the table to her stew and pushed a carrot around for a moment. “What were you hoping to do for S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

“I’d assumed they wanted me to go beat people up, that’s what made them hire me after all.” Clint shrugged. “What would they call that? Agent something I’m sure.”

“You’d be agent Barton but that’s what all S.H.I.E.L.D. people are called basically.” She glanced up at him with a smile. “You’d be a field agent probably. Going out and finding information, taking out enemy operatives, and things like that. It’s dangerous work.”

“Would you rather I have a desk position with them? If they even have those?” His expression looked pained at the thought and Laura shook her head.

“You’d go crazy. I’m going to be the one with the desk position.” Laura met his eyes and smiled slightly. “It’ll keep me sane and make sure you never have to wonder where I am or if I’m alright. Though, so help me Clint, if you ever miss a check in I will hunt you down myself.”

“Okay, so don’t get killed or you’ll get killed trying to find me.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek. “Got it.”

Laura relaxed into her chair and started eating as he got up to get himself more stew. “Could you get me tea while you’re up?”

“Of course worry wort.” He chuckled and so did she.

At the end of the meal she remembered that she still had about three more essays due and two more exams in the next week and a half but at least that conversation was out of the way.

 

—

 

May first found Clint and Laura standing outside a building that looked so obnoxiously normal that it practically screamed ‘there’s a secret government agency operating from inside of me.’ They’d left their apartment empty and locked up as the packet had said they’d have dorms for the duration but had not said when training would end. Laura barely contained her laughter as they walked inside, there were guards at each of the corners of what could only be called the main hall, on either side of the door, at each of the three elevators, and at the information desk. She touched Clint’s arm so he’d look at her. “Gods, Stark industries doesn’t even have this many guards.”

“I’ve got to teach you more signs.” Clint replied as a nearby guard turned to glare at them.

“Probably a good plan.” Laura said, shooting a grin towards the guard who was glaring. She’d been to Stark industries as a kid, at the very least the guards were better hidden. Then she headed towards the desk, trading codes from the information packet director Fury had given them, with a person who gave her the blandest smile she’d ever seen. Bland Smile directed them towards the third elevator, bottom floor. After that was a series of elevators, codes, and one very speedy train. At the end of the train was one more elevator that opened up in what looked for all intents and purposes like a shed. Once they stepped out of it there were dozens of other kids, young adults really, milling about in the field. To the far left of the shed was a large building that appeared to be made entirely of glass and mirrors, to the right was a building that looked like it might have been a mansion in another life. It was a giant brick structure that looked a bit like a school on steroids.

“You know the administration frowns on recruits dating each other.” A girl who looked like she’d just stepped out of a teen movie stood in front of the two of them with her arms crossed. “You could at least be a bit less obvious about it.”

Laura looked at Clint who had his eyebrow raised and she just shrugged, she’d never seen the girl before. At some point though they’d started holding hands so Laura dropped his hand and held hers out towards the girl. “I’m Laura, nice to meet you?”

“Ugh.” The girl scoffed and walked away with a toss of her perfectly braided hair.

“Ignore her, she’s found a reason to be pissy with everyone. I’m Bobbi, it was Laura right?” Another girl came up to them and offered her hand. The similarities between this one and the last one ended at their blond hair, she was built like a powerhouse: all muscle and height with the kind of easy grin that spoke of either a very interesting or a very boring past. It wasn’t until Clint nudged her Laura realized she’d been staring and shook Bobbi’s hand.

“Yeah, and this is Clint.” Laura gestured to him, pleased to realize her voice at least still worked.

“Pleasure.” He grinned as Bobbi shook his hand as well.

Laura looked around the field with a small frown. “Our packet of information stopped at this field, or technically the elevator. Yours have anything useful for this point forward?”

“Nah, everyone appears to be in the same boat.” Bobbi shrugged glancing around at the lot of them. “Some of them are trying to figure something out but most have just started getting to know each other.”

“Well, we’d best get comfortable then.” Clint took a few steps away from the door of the shed and dropped to sit with his legs crossed under him.

Bobbi frowned in his direction. “I don’t think-”

“He can’t hear you.” Laura interrupted tapping her ear before walking over towards him. “Not if he can’t see you.”

As she sat down beside Clint, Bobbi shrugged and wandered off, clearly not one comfortable with sitting still when she didn’t know everything yet.

They waited and a dozen or so more young adults came through the shed and joined in the milling about, very few of them seemed able to settle. About two hours after they’d come through the shed, just as Laura was debating finding Bobbi and making sure she’d also brought a water bottle, a jeep drove up to them from directly opposite the shed. Though there was no way to tell which building it had come from Laura would bet that it had come from the school on steroids. The two men who stepped out were built like brick walls themselves and both Clint and Laura were on their feet before the two had even finished getting out of the jeep. The group of young adults who’d been milling in anything from casual to anxiety induced but pretending at casual, formed a loose half circle around the jeep. Almost all of them looking at it with a mix of interest and suspicion.

“I’m agent Black, this is agent White, we’re going to be who you lot are answering to for the duration of your training.” One of the agents stepped forward not cracking even the smallest of smiles at the group who faced him.

“Those cannot be their real names.” Clint said quietly to Laura who bit her lip to avoid laughing.

“We are not your friends, do not try to act like we are.” Agent White stepped in front of the jeep and glared at the lot of them. “We are your commanding officers from now until either you quit or you pass.”

“How quickly you do either is entirely up to you.” Agent Black said looking around at them with the same blank expression he’d had since he stepped out of the jeep. “I hope you all wore comfortable shoes.”

Agent White stepped back towards the jeep and opened his door. “You’ll be following us back to the dorms, if you think this treatment is unfair or that following the jeep would be too hard, you are free to go back the way you came.”

“They seem pleasant.” Laura said quietly to Clint as agents White and Black climbed into the jeep and turned it around to start driving.

“The booming voices make them easy to hear at least.” Clint grinned back at her as they all started jogging after the jeep.

Unsurprisingly, at least to Laura, the jeep lead back to a large rather squat looking brick building, to the surprise of everyone, including Laura, the building wasn’t actually part of the school on steroids. The building was almost equal distance from both the school on steroids and the glass and mirror building, if you included the shed as a building the four of them made an almost perfect square. The jeep pulled up a handful of steps from the door and the group of them made a loose half circle around agents White and Black again, several of them seemed entirely out of breath.

“I hope you all enjoyed your afternoon run.” Agent Black looked around at them his face twitching in what could almost be classified as a smile before it returned to his regular frown.

“Welcome to your dorms trainees.” Agent White gestured at the building behind them. “Girls go to the right, boys to the left. The cafeteria is straight ahead, nurses’ station is to the left just before the doors to the cafeteria.”

“Don’t take a dorm that’s already in use.” Agent Black seemed almost bored at this point. “If you have an issue with another trainee I don’t want to hear about it.”

“We’ll see you bright and early trainees.” Agent White gave them a grin that seemed not at all friendly. “05:00 right here, in the trainee gear that’s been provided in your dorms.”

With that agents Black and White got into their jeep and drove off, no doubt to where ever they stayed.

“Not big on the Q&A those two huh?” Clint nudged Laura’s arm as they drove away.

“Evidently not.” Laura sighed looking at the building. Hopefully this training would keep her too busy for her insomnia and nightmares to make it hell.

“We’ll be fine.” Clint said quietly, bumping his shoulder against hers when she looked at him. “You’ll be fine.”

 

—

 

Waking up at five am and waking up for five am were very different things, which was the first big different Laura noticed on her first day of training. In the cafeteria a half an hour before five am most of the trainees were moving like slugs, a handful of others were awake but not particularly pleased about it, and the rest of them looked like they might have gone for a quick jog before coming to breakfast. Laura and Clint fell into the middle category, both had plenty of experience waking up at ungodly hours of the morning for something or another. Bobbi fell into the latter category, and Laura was secretly pleased to see that the angry girl from the day before fell into the first category. Both coffee and tea were available and Laura happily grabbed a cup of tea along with the bacon and eggs the cafeteria staff were serving, most of them Laura noted fell into the middle category as well.

As she sat at the table Clint was at she looked around to see that Bobbi was eating a muffin and walking in circles around the cafeteria, greeting and chatting and more interestingly just not sitting down. She tapped Clint’s arm and nodded towards Bobbi. “Wonder what her deal is.”

“Too early to be wondering anything.” He muttered but looked over anyway, raising his eyebrow when he saw Bobbi up and moving around. “Maybe she’s got a vendetta against sitting.”

“She’s making friends.” Laura continued to watch her, amused more than anything else. Bobbi moved easily between groups her expressions shifting slightly with each new person she talked to. “She’ll be a field agent for sure.”

Clint glanced down at his watch. “Quarter to, we should finish up here.”

Laura nodded and polished off the last of her eggs. They dropped their plates in the bin left out for them on the way to the front of the building. The jeep was already parked outside but either agents Black and White hadn’t gotten out yet or they were hiding somewhere nearby because as Laura and Clint joined the few who were already outside and milling about they were nowhere to be seen. At exactly 05:00 the jeep doors opened and agents Black and White got out. Both of them with the same expressionless faces they’d had the day before.

Everyone snapped to attention, arms down and shoulders back, almost automatically as the agents walked towards them. Agent Black was the first to speak this time. “Alright Trainees I hope you all a good rest.”

“We have a busy schedule for the day.” Agent White nodded looking around at everyone as though he was memorizing their faces. “The same schedule you’ll have every day.”

“Except on test day and the rest day on either side, after every ten days.” Agent Black said before turning around and walking back to the jeep.

“Step to Trainees, we’ve got places to be.” Agent White followed agent Black into the jeep and it started moving.

Laura sighed and started jogging. The rest of the day was spent in what had to be something out of one of her nightmares. They jogged after the jeep to an obstacle course surrounded by a running track and the agents directed them to run laps in groups. Once the required number of laps was completed one of the agents would direct the group towards the obstacle course and they’d move through that as the agent followed beside the course shouting or frowning depending on which agent it was.

Following that they jogged to a firing range and learned how to take apart, put back together, and fire a handful of different guns. Then there was target practice, followed by each of them being handed a packet of information to memorize on weapon use and laws in different countries and a warning that it would be on the test in ten days. At which point agents Black and White directed them to jog back to the barracks and told them they had until 13:00 to meet them at the front of the building again.

The afternoon started with jogging back towards the obstacle course and then turning and going towards a building Laura hadn’t even noticed until they headed towards it. As it turned out there was something worse than laps and obstacle courses as they spent the afternoon on a workout circuit that made Laura wonder why they didn’t just use it as a torture device. They had a quick break for dinner, served in the same building at the workout circuit, and an hour spent in a classroom being lectured on something that they were assured would likely be on the test. Then it was back to the circuit. By the time agents Black and White released them to head towards the barracks for the night- sometime after sunset but Laura was too tired to check her watch- even Bobbi and most of the other overly athletic folks were shaking at least a little bit.

“I can’t decide if they’re trying to kill us or train us.” Clint muttered as they headed towards the barracks.

“Both.” Laura attempted to smile at him and tugged on the braid she’d put her hair into in the morning, strands were falling out but she’d redo it once she’d slept.

“Asshole better be right about that whole ‘you’re made for this line of work’ line he kept trying to sell me on.” Clint muttered.

“Gods I hope so.” Laura chuckled. She was not looking forwards to nine more days of this.

 

—

 

“Lauretta?” A guy who looked like a cross between a supermodel and a tank leaned over her table at dinner a handful of days into their training. He got close enough to her that she could see Clint go all high alert beside her, not that anyone who didn’t know him would realize he wasn’t focused on his food. “It is you! Damn girl, when you stormed out of your parents I thought you were done with all of this.”

“I was.” Laura twisted to look up at him. “Ah, Nate, should have guessed you’d be coming in about now.”

“I am the only of my siblings to always be on time.” He grinned looking completely relaxed. “So why are you sitting over here with this one instead of with us, where you belong?”

“You’re not paying attention again Nate.” Laura smiled at him and she saw his shoulders stiffen, he was still sensitive about that then. “I’m apparently not done with S.H.I.E.L.D. but I am done with the life my parents planned for me.”

“Oh Lauretta…” A girl she hadn’t noticed walking up leaned on Nate’s arm and smiled at her, a smile she’d recognize anywhere. “You really think you can split the two that easily?”

“It was never easy Annie.” Laura could feel her smile turning sad then she felt Clint shift beside her, giving her something to lean on. “We all have to live with our choices.”

“Hm.” Annie sniffed looking between her and Clint with an expression Laura knew meant trouble. “Well come along Nate, she’s clearly determined to walk the losing path.”

“Here I thought we might be able to bring you home.” For his part Nate did look genuinely sad, not that it would make any difference really. “Too bad.”

“I am home Nate. Are you?” For a second after Laura asked his something almost like conflict flashed across his face, then his easy grin was back and he just shrugged, following Annie back to the others. Laura leaned into Clint for a moment before turning back towards her food. “It would be those two who were in our training group.”

“I feel like I missed half of that conversation.” Clint glanced between her and the table the other had gone back to, the table with half a dozen people at it all of whom looked like they already had some form of military training.

“You did.” Laura focused on her food. “Our parents had very specific futures planned for each of us.”

“Sounds lovely.” Clint looked back at his food when it was clear she wasn’t going to explain any more than that.

It didn’t take long until it became clear that the subject was far from dropped, as much as Laura would have liked otherwise. During the lap running portion, the group of them would take turns running beside Laura and hiding their snide comments among chatter. This would of course draw either agent Black or agent White’s attention and they’d come over to give them what for speaking instead of focusing on running.

Then on day seven of their training a group of three girls cornered them after dinner, when they were supposed to be making their way to the classroom.

“Lauretta it’s been so long, won’t you at least visit us once training is over?” One of the girls said with a smile like ice.

“It’ll be painless Lauretta, just popping in to say hello to your family and childhood friends.” Another said not even bothering to hide her sneer behind a smile. “Or are you to scared?”

“Poor little Lauretta was always the most sensitive of us wasn’t she?” The third chimed in, staring down Clint rather than bothering to look at Laura. “Still is clearly as she’s hanging around this charity case.”

“Sensitive little Lauretta found the perfect case didn’t she?” The first still had her smile. “A little deaf boy she can try and get into S.H.I.E.L.D. because he wants to be a spy or a soldier or some such.”

“I don’t know how to explain this to you.” The third said, slowly and loudly because she was now speaking to Clint. “But deaf boys don’t get to be spies, you need to be able to listen to manage that.”

“Funny because I was fairly certain I said on the first day to be on time and that I didn’t want to hear about your problems with each other. Then the day after that I said that everyone was to report to the classroom after dinner.” Agent Black’s voice had all four of them whirling to look at him. "Did I not?"

The middle girl stepped towards agent Black with what was likely supposed to be a charming smile. "They're also-" 

"Poor excuses considering this boy has never been so much as a minute late to anything, a boast none of you three can make." Agent Black's frown deepened as he cut her off. “And the only reason he is late currently would seem to be because you three are blocking his path forcing me to come listen to your problems when you should be listening to what you will be tested on.”

“My apologies agent Black.” Laura stepped forward, forcing two of the girls to step out of her way. “It won’t happen again.”

“If they’re correct and he’s deaf I imagine it’s you who’s translating what he doesn’t pick up.” Agent Black looked between her and Clint for a moment before nodding. “Congratulations to both of you for being able to keep up, this is a fast paced place.”

“Thank you sir.” Clint nodded to agent Black and then tapped his hearing aid. “As long as I have these though, I’m usually able to understand what people say.”

“Good, you’ll need all the help you can get to catch up in the current lesson.” Agent Black jerked his thumb towards the classroom and they headed off before he had to ask a second time.

 

—

 

After agent Black caught the three who had cornered them, who rumor had it would not be allowed to take the upcoming placement test and would have to do another ten days training, the other trainees stopped bothering Laura and Clint directly. That didn’t mean they stopped however, instead those who Laura had grown up with started talking to those she hadn’t. For a group as old and exhausted as the trainees they had a hell of a rumor mill once it was started. The whispers cut off as soon as they noticed Laura or Clint close enough to overhear, not that that stopped them from hearing it.

“Did you hear the latest?” Laura asked looking over at where Clint was sprawled on the only other bunk that was claimed, by Bobbi, in what was supposed to be the extra girls’ barracks. She delivered the rumors she’d heard in the same tone one might use to discuss the weather or the growth of grass. “You’re strong but stupid apparently, they’re not sure why you’re here.”

“See, I heard you don’t belong here.” Clint grinned at her, unable to keep a serious tone about this even for a lark. “Not smart enough by half, you don’t even have a single PhD, and not near as strong as the others. You can hardly brute force yourself through anything at all, a real waste of potential.”

“I’ve heard whispers you’ve never ever been to uni.” Laura said, false shock and horror creeping into her tone. “And never served anywhere, how someone with so few qualifications got into recruitment at all is hard to tell.”

“Must be the same favoritism that let you in.”

“Charity case.”

“Sleeping with the director.”

“Bought their way in.”

“Ended up here by mistake.”

“Lied.”

“Forgery.”

“Get off my bed you.” Bobbi interrupted them to sigh at Clint. “There’s a dozen bunks in here and you always end up sprawled on mine.”

“Yours is the nicest.” Clint grinned up at her for a moment before rolling off and flopping onto Laura’s bunk where he landed with his head on her leg.

“That’s why it’s mine.” Bobbi nodded dropping onto her bed once he’d moved. “That and there’s less going on in this room.”

“That’s because you’re the only one willing to bunk with the maybe charity case who’s either lying, sleeping, or forging her way into S.H.I.E.L.D.” Laura said as her fingers slid through Clint’s ‘getting just too long to be respectable’ hair.

“True.” Bobbi nodded rolling her eyes as she looked at them. “They’re calling you Brains and Brawn now, in a way that implies neither of you are really enough of either one.”

“Naturally.” Laura nodded. “Well, if they’re right the placement test tomorrow should have us both booted out.”

“I think that’s what they're counting on.” Bobbi smirked slightly as she said it.

“Clearly they weren’t paying attention when agents Black and White explained.” Clint said in a tone that suggested he wasn’t paying attention. “It’s a placement test, failing just means we’ll get another ten days of this hell.”

“So he does pay attention.” Bobbi’s voice suggested amusement more than surprise and they both just nodded in response. “I figured Laura didn’t sign enough to be interpreting everything for you.”

“She’s getting better.” Clint shrugged, sending a lazy grin in Bobbi’s direction. “You worried?”

“For tomorrow?” Bobbi’s grin was more like a snarl really. “Not a chance.”

 

—

 

The next day everyone was up and in front of the barracks by five in the morning, most of them looking like they really could have used a few more hours of sleep. Agents Black and White were up and as usual looking like they’d already had a jog and a balanced breakfast.

“Good morning Trainees!” Agents White boomed at them. “Are you ready for the test that will decide if you get to remain in these barracks or move on?”

“Ready or not.” Agent Black shrugged and turned for the jeep.

They all knew enough to get ready to jog after it.

The first part of the test was, rather unsurprisingly, physical. First there was an obstacle course that had to have been set up either overnight or during their rest day as Laura had never seen it before and got the distinct feeling no one would ever see it again. Each of them ran through it alone. They were timed and watched by agents Black and White as well as a dozen Observers who wore the same sort of outfits agents Black and White wore.

As Laura finished the course she was directed, by an unremarkable agent in an unremarkable outfit, towards a shooting range where another board of Observers watched as she examined, took apart, put back together, and fired half a dozen different weapons.

Once finished that she was directed, by another unremarkable agent in another unremarkable outfit, towards the building they usually had lunch in. Unlike most days though lunch wasn’t set out and it was just her and the handful who had gone before her milling around in the large room. It felt much the same as it had that first day out of the elevator without knowing what happens next except that this time she knew no one in this room particularly wanted her here. She sat on a bench near the entrance with her back to the corner and waited for Clint to finish his run.

Even though both Clint and Bobbi finished within not to long of her none of them said anything to each other. Bobbie was back at her old habits, pacing the room like it had information to give her. Laura herself was too busy watching everything to really notice if Clint was trying to speak to her so he didn’t try. Once everyone was finished food was served but Laura spent more time pushing her food around her plate than eating it, though she did manage to remind Clint to eat his greens and he managed to roll his eyes at her.

When agents Black and White entered the room there was a great deal of scurrying around as everyone moved at once to remove their food from the tables.

“Right, you have ten minutes to finish up and make it to the classroom where you will be tested on what you’ve learned.” Agent White nodded around at all of them.

“For those of you who have done this before let me assure you, every test is different.” Agent Black looked around at them, his face as blank as it had been on the first day.

Then both agents walked out of the room and there was another flurry of activity as the trainees scrambled to try and make themselves ready. Not that it seemed to matter all that much. The test was a strange mix of written and multiple choice and despite having taken notes and studied every day Laura felt like they had only been given half of the information required to do well on the test. Within the first few questions she was approaching them as she would particularly complicated logic problems rather than tests. She guessed and occasionally outright fabricated answers to questions whose purpose she wasn’t entirely certain of and by the end of the thing she felt like she had more questions than had been answered. As she finished the last question she felt both like she had no idea what she’d just written and like she’d been studying for this exact test all her life. It was a strange mix of emotions.

Leaving the classroom after finishing the exam she found that most of those who’d finished, only a handful had finished before her, were just milling around outside waiting for directions. Laura sat in the grass and stared up at the clouds feeling like she’d aged at least a decade in the last two weeks. Clint joined her wordlessly a short while later.

Agents Black and White showed up with their jeep about ten minutes before the last couple trainees filed out of the building. Once they stepped out of their jeep everyone stood up and stood at attention.

“Congratulations Trainees.” Agent Black looked around with what for him passed as a smile. “You’ve completed a full rotation.”

“During your free day tomorrow, any of you who have shown great ability will receive letters of offer.” Agent White crossed his arms. “I expect those of you who do not to join any new trainees at 05:00 the next morning in front of the barracks.”

“Good luck.” Agent Black nodded and both he and agent White climbed into the jeep and drove away.

The rest of the day was simple, they trekked back to the barracks and got dinner. Some of the trainees milled around in the common areas but most retreated back to their bunks. Bobbi said nothing when Clint followed her and Laura back to the room they shared and curled up on Laura’s bunk with her.

The next morning there was a stack of letters on the table inside the door of their room, several of them addressed to Clint which amused Bobbi to no end. Laura’s letters offered her further training for either a field or desk placement as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent or further study in any university field of her choice with eventual placement into the science and technology division of S.H.I.E.L.D. and she smiled as she looked them over.

“They’re offering me like thirty different weirdly specific types of training for S.H.I.E.L.D. field agent stuff.” Clint swapped letters with Laura and grinned as they looked over each other’s. “You’re not too shabby yourself here.”

“Yeah okay you two gloat all you like, I can have my pick of almost anything short of the SciTech division.” Bobbi grinned at them. “I’m thinking of just joining the academy, aim for field agent, and work my way into specializing later if I like.”

“I’m specializing as a spy for sure, maybe a sniper?” Clint grinned then snagged his letter from Laura. “The correct term is something to do with information agent I think.”

“Espionage and information gathering agent.” Laura rattled off without thought, a slight blush rising to her cheeks as both of them looked at her with raised eyebrows. “And you should do both that and sniper, they’re very compatible specializations.”

“What about you then?” Bobbi asked reaching over to tug gently on Laura’s braid with a grin that was almost sly. “Are you going to be an espionage and information gathering agent?”

“I’m aware that the name is redundant and no.” Laura rolled her eyes. “I like the idea of a desk job, a regular S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who deals in paperwork and psychology.”

“Of course you do.” Bobbi laughed and held out her hand towards Laura. “It’s been lovely training with you, call me if you ever need to be saved from a mountain of paperwork falling on you.”

“Will do.” Laura laughed shaking Bobbi’s hand and watching as she also shook Clint.

“See you around.” Bobbi saluted them with her letters before walking off, no doubt excited to start her new training regimen.


	7. Paper work, Promotions, and Missions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that they've joined S.H.I.E.L.D. Laura and Clint climb ranks with a startling efficiency

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am mostly making up how S.H.I.E.L.D. works as I go along as it changes constantly
> 
> Shoutout to Lindy (rooish on tumblr) for editing, suggestions, and being a generally wonderful person.

 

 

Their letters directed them to different orientations, and though Laura took careful notes in hers, she mostly wondered if Clint’s was anywhere near as boring. She was pleased to learn that they would no longer be required to live on the S.H.I.E.L.D. base and instead could live in their own apartments again. Though, the agent in charge of their orientation was quick to assure them they could live on base, there were even dorms provided. As it turned out, after the initial hell weeks of training, S.H.I.E.L.D. operated very similarly to a regular university campus; though with some highly interesting courses.

Laura signed up for all her training courses that day, along with any optional courses that had to do with psychology or neurology. When she handed the forms to the agent they gave her a confused once over like they wanted to ask why she was in this particular field. They didn’t ask though so she didn’t explain.

By the time she got home that night, after browsing through the S.H.I.E.L.D. book store and stopping to pick up a few groceries, Clint had already started cooking. Laura dropped the groceries on the counter and her books on the desk. She tapped Clint on the shoulder and hopped up onto the counter beside the stove.

“Welcome home.” He smiled up at her. “Apparently I’m almost too good for my training already, they’re giving me a few brush up courses but they figure they can start sending me out before the end of summer.”

“Lucky you.” Laura gestured towards her pile of book. “I basically get to go to school, mostly my choice, and I’ll be working at the same time. My desk job sorting level 1 intelligence starts on Monday.”

“So you’ve got the job but you signed up for a bunch of extra training anyway?” Clint said lifting a spoonful of whatever he was cooking towards her. “Taste, I’m trying a new sauce.”

“Yeah pretty much.” Laura leaned forward to taste the sauce and started grinning. “That’s really good, when did you figure out white cream sauces?”

“Just now, turns out there’s this wonderful new-fangled thing called an Internet.”

“You’re ridiculous.” She rolled her eyes. Then she let out a long breath, almost but not quite a sigh, and looked around the small apartment. “It’s good to be home.”

“Tired of all your childhood friends already?” Clint gave her that smirk that was designed to make it look like he didn’t care.

“We were hardly even friends as children.” She shrugged looking towards her pile of books and feeling very small all of a sudden. “I much prefer your company.”

There was a moment of silence and when she looked back at him Clint was looking at her with so much warmth and concern she almost had to look away again. “You alright?”

“Yeah I’m…” She trailed off for a moment before nodding. “I will be.”

“Good.” He poured the sauce into his bowl of pasta and once he’d put the pan down he took her hand and tugged gently. She slid off the counter and into his arms with a laugh that turned into a squeal as he spun her around in a poor approximation of dancing. Laura leaned into him with a smile, it was really good to be home.

 

—

 

The next few weeks were made almost entirely of long days. The ten days of waking up before five am had ensured that both Laura and Clint woke up early regardless of how they felt about it. The first few hours of the day were soon characterized by Laura reading through the books she had for her S.H.I.E.L.D. training, either in bed or on the couch. Then one of them would make breakfast and they’d both head off to the office, as it turned out the underground train they’d gotten on the first day actually traveled from the first building they’d been to- S.H.I.E.L.D. just liked to screw with new recruits. Clint would take the train off to his training and Laura would go up the elevator to the offices for level 1 staff. She’d study between bouts of information sorting and after her shift she’d take the train to the S.H.I.E.L.D. campus for her courses. She rarely got back until late in the night, leaving Clint to be the one doing most of the cooking.

To no one’s surprise but her own, she aced all the extra training, even completing several of them in close to record time. Within a month she was cleared for level 2 and moved from her floor to another, the agents on her floor offered her the kind of congratulations you offer to someone you’ve never even met. On the level 2 floor there were desks instead of cubicles and Laura made sure to introduce herself to the people in her general vicinity. Even going so far as to remember some of their names and interests. Like Bill, short for William, who had the desk to her right and was rather obsessed with cats. He had three and would tell you everything about them if you listened for more than half a second. Vivian was directly in front of Laura and spent more time turned around talking to Laura, Bill, and Serenity than she did actually looking at her computer. Serenity was to Laura’s left and she lived up to her name, her voice never straying from a pleasant sort of quiet and she kept a small pot of wildflowers on her desk.

Her stay on this floor didn’t last long either though, as once she’d completed the psychology and neurology courses she got a visit from an agent. Much like the agents who’d pointed the trainees around during their tests, they were entirely unremarkable. They led her to the elevator, up a handful of floors, down a hallway, and into a small room. “Wait here.”

Laura didn’t have time to respond before they left her alone in the room. She glanced out the window, wall really the whole building seemed made of one sided glass, and out at the city she had always thought she knew fairly well.

“Laura Smith, is it?” A voice said from the doorway. Laura turned to see a woman, who honestly looked not much older than herself, with brown hair pulled back into a braid that really didn’t suit her face. “Agent Maria Hill, I’ve heard a great deal about you.”

“You’d look better with bangs.” Laura moved to sit at the table that was the only furnishing the room possessed. “Though I doubt you called me here for fashion advice.”

“No, we didn’t.” Another voice joined in as none other than director Fury himself walked through the door behind agent Hill, closing it before both he and agent Hill sat across from Laura.

“We’re training a team of psychologists, neuroscientists, and other specialists for exceptional cases.” Agent Hill said it with her hands folded on the table in front of her and an expression like Laura should be able to fill in the blanks herself. “Director Fury thinks you’d make a good addition.”

“You think I’m under qualified.” Laura said before director Fury had a chance to say anything, watching until agent Hill nodded before continuing. “You’re right, and everyone else on the team and in positions in power will agree with you.”

“Not everyone.” Director Fury said and Laura looked at him with an eyebrow raised. “You have exceptional circumstances yourself.”

“Clint.” Laura nodded thoughtfully. “And the circus.”

“I’d had an agent in that circus for months but they never got anyone to open up to them.” Director Fury nodded and agent Hill gave him a look like she was annoyed to only be hearing about this now. “You were in the inner circle within days.”

“They’re good people.” Laura heard the edge her voice took on and part of her was pleased with the way agent Hill looked at her, like she was re-evaluating.

“Our investigation wasn’t into their characters.” Director Fury shook his head. “We’d heard rumors of exceptional cases.”

“Exceptional how?” Laura kept her body relaxed through sheer force of will as she stared director Fury down.

“Nothing solid really, animal trainers whose animals responded like it was a conversation, acrobats who completed impossible jumps.” Director Fury shrugged like that explained what he’d been looking for. “Our agents never found anything substantial and we were forced to drop the investigation.”

“These exceptional cases.” Agent Hill leaned forwards slightly. “We’ve been calling them enhanced, or sometimes just exceptional. The most famous would be Captain America.”

“I see.” Laura let her arms cross, hoping they’d stop beating around the bush sometime today.

“We’d like you to join the team, help us monitor anyone we think might fit in this category.” Director Fury passed a file to her that she hadn’t noticed him holding. “You’d be promoted to level 4, and it would be under the guise of us training a new psychologist for our field agents.”

“You duties would involve monitoring the mental well being of the agents assigned to you as well as searching for signs of exceptionality. You have two days to decide if you want the position.” Agent Hill stood and director Fury followed her.

 Once they were gone Laura opened the file they’d given her. There wasn’t a lot of information in the thing but it did give her a better idea of their intentions for this group they wanted her to join. It was the psychology equivalent of divide and conquer. Anyone who’d done anything that stood out on the exams would be assigned to one or multiple of the groups; they’d create trust and find out if they were truly an exceptionality or not. By the time she reached the end of the handful of sheets she knew she was going to do it. If she was going to be part of S.H.I.E.L.D. she wanted to be one of the ones making the calls, not just an agent who had to carry them out.

 

—

 

“Laura, thank you for joining me, sit please.” Agent Hill gestured to the seat in front of her desk without looking up from the file she was reading as Laura walked into her office. “There are some things we need to discuss.”

“Your message mentioned that.” Laura said dryly as she sat down. “I’m assuming you have more specific topics or at least a reason as to why it’s me you need to discuss things with?”

“Yes.” This conversation clearly wasn’t going to be the one where Laura figured out if Agent Hill actually had a sense of humor or not. “It has been brought to my attention that despite having put you on the task force that’s looking for exceptionalities I have not given you all the information you should know.”

“Shouldn’t I have access to it with my current clearance level?”

“Most of it.” Agent Hill gave a curt nod and Laura raised an eyebrow. “You have access to the basics but it’s unlikely you’d look it up on your own time, having already passed the stage yourself. There are a handful of ways into S.H.I.E.L.D. and we’ve found that once people are in they rarely bother to look up the other ways to get in.”

“Other than the ten days of insanity?”

“Yes.” She nodded again and gestured to the file in front of her which was closed and had a classified stamp on it; level 6 eyes only. “Most agents join through one of the academies. They apply to either the science branch of the S.H.I.E.L.D. academy, which requires that they already have at least one undergraduate degree, or to the military branch of the academy, which requires years of experience. In the science branch they’re expected to get at least a doctorate before they’re even considered as potential agents.”

“The ways the vaguely general public knows about.” Laura interjected.

“Yes, and not all of them actually join S.H.I.E.L.D. proper.” Agent Hill’s fingers were tapping lightly on her desk, one of the few tics the agent herself hadn’t seemed to have noticed yet. “There are a few less well known ways, the ten day program you came through is used when we come across people we think could be useful. It has the bonus of also sorting exceptionalities from the regular sort of overachievers. We also bring certain people into S.H.I.E.L.D. through specific initiatives, each of which has its own level of clearance.”

“And why couldn’t you just point me towards the file?”

“Because I’ve also been told to discuss how this might affect you, and the rumors that are no doubt spreading about you.”

“How so?”

“You got in through the route used for those suspected of being exceptional.” Agent Hill said it with a sort of softness that sounded like breaking bad news. When Laura didn’t immediately respond she continued in the same sort of tone. “People who we tend to bend rules and regulations to have join us.”

“Like education requirements.” Laura nodded as it clicked what agent Hill was getting at.

“Like education requirements.”

There was a pause where agent Hill was clearly waiting for Laura to say something about the rumors or the education thing but those weren’t the topics that came to mind first. “So how does the ten day program work? From the judging side of things?”

Agent Hill’s expression morphed into something like surprise at that. “How do you think it does?”

“The whole ten days we had to participate in was a test of sorts. A way to be sure of choices and exceptionalities and a quick sorting method.” Laura paused for a moment as she sorted it in her mind. “It determines who can keep up, where they excel under pressure, how physical and mental strain affect them, and determines if the qualities you thought you saw, are true or not.”

“This is why you got so many placement offers, and why I was confused when you picked the one you did.” Now it was definitely confusion on agent Hill’s face. “I hadn’t pegged you as an office work sort, you’re much too capable.”

“You missed one thing in that file of yours, the one about me.” Laura gave her an easy smile. “The only reason I have anything to do with S.H.I.E.L.D., is Clint. Otherwise I would have continued with my original plan of avoiding you until I died.”

“Interesting way to phrase that.”

“I’m an interesting sort of person.” Laura leaned forward as a thought occurred to her. “So does that mean anyone you send to the exceptionalities group has likely been through the ten day route?”

“For the most part yes, some of them come through the academies, but it’s less likely.”

“That explains why it seems like some of them have been lying so long they’ve got themselves half convinced.”

“That would be likely for many of them.” Agent Hill nodded picking up the folder and filing it back into a drawer that Laura couldn’t see. “Any further questions?”

“That means the rumors are mostly right.” Laura grinned as she stood up, it wasn’t really a question after all. “The ones that say the higher ups are playing favourites with me and Clint. They’re not really wrong.”

“We aren’t playing favourites.”

“Course not.” Laura shrugged, stopping just before she closed the door behind her on the way out. “You just expect big things from us.”

The door clicked shut before agent Hill had to think up a response to that one and Laura headed back to the exceptionalities squad’s office.

 

—

 

True to their word, S.H.I.E.L.D. had Clint ready for missions by the time August’s muggy heat was just starting to give way to the chill that signaled fall. The first mission they handed him was a level 2 intelligence mission, simple recon. He handed Laura the packet once he read through it himself, despite his handler’s protests. Laura simply held out her own clearance badge, which had level 4 stamped under the title her group had been assigned. She read through the file only half paying attention as Clint’s handler lectured him on protocol and remembering how things are done. It seemed easy enough, get in, plug the device into the computer, and get to the planned evac location once the device had done what it was designed for.

She handed him the file back as his handler motioned for him to board the jet.

“Thanks love, I’ll see you when I get back.” He said it quietly, just before pressing a kiss to her forehead.

“Love you too.” Laura chuckled and Clint’s face reddened as he processed what he’d said. “Come home safe yeah?”

“Of course, it’s a simple mission.” Clint nodded turning and following his handler onto the jet.

“Honestly Laura,” Agent Hill’s voice from behind her had Laura rolling her eyes before she even turned around. “Do you know how many protocols you two are breaking?”

“About as many as the number of times you’ve told me.” Laura crossed her arms, easily matching Agent Hill’s posture. “Aren’t you breaking protocol by not calling me Agent?”

“Just because your level gives you clearance doesn’t mean you’re supposed to go poking around and playing favourites.” She snapped before handing Laura a folder. “You have a new charge, he got completely average scores on every aspect of his test.”

“Average?” Laura opened the file, following Agent Hill on autopilot as they walked towards the wing Laura was technically supposed to be in. According to the file his name was John Smith, he’d done some military service during which he’d never managed to stand out in anyway. He was by all accounts completely average in every way except that he was here in S.H.I.E.L.D. Not only was he completely average, at least not in the normal way; he’d scored dead center on every exam S.H.I.E.L.D. had thrown at him. “Exactly average, impressive.”

“I thought you’d be the right pick for him.” Agent Hill pointed towards one of the rooms they did assessments in. “He’s waiting for you.”

Laura nodded, her nose still in the file as she walked into the room and around to her seat. She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she skimmed the file again. He looked as average as his file, his skin somewhere between white enough to pass and tan enough to not be entirely Caucasian, his hair was a dull brown with a slight wave, and his eyes were an unremarkable brown. Even his build couldn’t be places as anything other than average, some muscle but not enough to be muscular, and a little bit of fat around the waist and in his cheeks but not enough to be chubby. She wondered just how much of it was intentional.

“Well Mr. Smith, or is it Agent Smith now?” Laura cut herself off as she put down her file and looked at him. “You are arguably the most boring person I’ve ever met and I truly mean that as a compliment.”

“Pardon?” He stared at her, clearly caught off guard by her statement.

“You’re completely average in every way, not remarkable in the slightest. Other than being able to get into S.H.I.E.L.D.” She closed the file and leaned back in her chair to examine him. “How did you manage that?”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.” He shook his head looking for all the world like he was genuinely confused.

“I mean, I tried average. I really did.” Laura continued like he hadn’t denied it. “When I was a kid I mean, my sister was the pretty one and my brother was the smart one so I figured I’d be average. I really did try.”

“Why would you try to be average?” His confusion intensified as she kept speaking.

“It seemed the safest option.” Laura shrugged appearing as relaxed as she knew how. “I’d seen up close the attention exceptional brought and I didn’t want that.”

“So you were average?”

“Turned out I was no good at it.” Laura shook her head. “I was too clever, too strong, and to determined to do things the way I wanted them done.”

“Not good qualities for average.” He shook his head as well, mirroring her posture. “To be average you have to know the how and why of everyone else and follow the middle path, regardless of how you want things done.”

“So that’s how you do it.” Laura grinned and watched as he truly registered what he’d just said. “So the cleverness wasn’t my problem, just my willingness to show it.”

“I didn’t-”

“You did and do, it’s alright though.” Laura said reaching over to pat his hand. “Exceptionally average people make fantastic espionage agents.”

“How did you do that?” He leaned forward as he asked, entirely letting go of his guise of confusion and allowing the spark of interest to show on his face and in his eyes. “How did you convince me to tell you?”

“Everyone wants to tell someone their secrets. It’s just a matter of learning how to be that someone.” Laura stood with a grin. “This has been a productive first session. I will see you again in a few days.”

“Yeah, see you around.” As he watched her leave, the spark disappeared from his face replaced once again with casual bafflement.

Once out of the room she headed towards the office she shared with the rest of her group. Agent Hill was leaning against her desk and she grinned at her as she tucked the file into her locked drawer. “He’s brilliant, I like him.”

“You don’t have any siblings.” She glared in response to Laura’s grin.

“No.” Laura sighed locking the drawer again.

“You can’t just lie to them! You’re supposed to be building trust!” Agent Hill had her arms crossed and Laura would bet it was to keep from gesturing.

“I didn’t lie.”

“Your file would argue against that.”

“Funny how that happens.” Laura’s smile was bland as she sat at her computer to get to work on paperwork.

“Are you telling me your file is wrong?” Agent Hill was standing beside her desk now, her fingers tightening on her own arms as her whole body radiated annoyance.

“I’m not telling you anything Agent.” She swiveled her chair to face Agent Hill, but didn’t stand up. “But you are causing a scene, you wouldn’t want the other team members to think you’re playing favourites would you?”

“You’re insufferable.” Agent Hill muttered all but storming off.

A few of the other agents in the room turned to raise eyebrows at Laura. She just grinned at them. “I don’t think she’s my biggest fan.”

“I don’t think she’s anyone’s fan.” One of the others snorted and everyone more or less turned back to their assigned tasks.

 

—

 

“Agent Smith.” An agent Laura barely knew in passing stood beside her desk one day in the middle of winter when Laura had stopped counting by months and started counting by snowfalls. It was some number of weeks after a Christmas which had gone almost entirely uncelebrated as Clint had been on a mission over the days of celebration. “You are agent Smith correct? Agent Hill said I should speak to you.”

“What about this time?” Laura raised her eyebrows, not bothering to sit down. When Hill sent someone she usually ended up having to follow them somewhere.

“Well, there’s something we could use your help with.” The agent scratched the back of his neck looking honestly sheepish, not a look most agents let themselves have. “We being the handlers for missions I mean, it’s one of our agents really, they’re proving to be, well difficult.”

“My current job is convincing people to tell me the truth, when they’ve mostly convinced themselves the lies they’re living are the truth.” Laura said with a small smirk. “What could possibly be more difficult than that?”

“Well it’s Agent Barton- why are you laughing?” The agent was looking at her like perhaps she’d finally cracked but Laura couldn’t help it.

“Really? Barton was a trainee with me.” Laura said after taking a deep breath or two to calm down. “How in the world is he giving you handlers a hard time? He’s hardly what I’d call a loose cannon.”

“No, they get sent straight to you lot these days.” The agent shook his head, looking calmer now that her laughter had faded. “He’s just, he doesn’t listen or can’t listen rather. He’s gone through every handler we have and none of them will work with him more than twice because he always takes his com unit’s out halfway through the mission, the ones that are built into his hearing aids.”

“So you need somewhere to dump him and Hi- Agent Hill sent you to me?” Laura raised an eyebrow, it wasn’t like Clint to just pull his hearing aids out for no reason.

“Yes.” He nodded rapidly pointing at a file that had been placed in the center of her desk. “Please, I know he’s not exactly what you lot are looking for but we can’t handle him on missions anymore. I do apologize for adding to your caseload.”

“Oh, that part is easy.” Laura waved one of the other agents over and pulled three files out of her locked drawer. “These three are ready for field placement, I’ve been making them jump through hoops to see if there’s anything extra to add to their file but I’ve been coming up empty. If they pass your evalve then just pass them off to whoever it is we’re supposed to send them to.”

“Why do you always get the fun cases?” Agent Williams took the files from her with a sigh before heading back to their desk.

“There, plenty of free time now.” Laura grinned patting the agent on the shoulder. “Does Agent Barton have a mission soon or do I have time for tea?”

“He’s leaving from hanger 12 in half an hour. If you meet us there in ten that would be stellar.” He looked so relieved Laura almost laughed again. “One of the handlers will stay with you through the mission, a simple assassination and hostage retake, and help you if you’re unsure of anything.”

He nodded once more and shot off before Laura had a chance to respond, possibly afraid she’d say no. She just shook her head and muttered under her breath. “Oh. Just a simple assassination and hostage retake, no biggie.”

“So you’re a proper handler now, gotta communicate non-stop with your charge and everything.” One of the other agents came up and leaned on her desk next to her, Agent Brown. She was one of the few who had visible laugh lines at the corners of her eyes, hints that in some other place she’d once had a sense of humor.

“Apparently, yes.” Laura picked up Clint’s file but didn’t bother opening it, she was well aware of what was in there.

“Rising through the ranks fast for someone with almost no qualifications.” Agent Brown nodded, not quite looking at Laura as she said it. “I’m impressed, others might lean more towards irritation if you aren’t careful.”

“Ah, but where’s the fun in being careful.” Laura pushed off from her desk, spinning to grin at Agent Brown. “I’ve always been partial to jumping off and building a jetpack on the way down.”

“I just hope you’ve got the schematics memorized girly.” The smirk on Agent Brown’s face almost reached her eyes, in much the same way that it almost seemed like she meant it as encouragement.

“Guess I’ll find out.” Laura tossed a salute towards her with the file and then headed off towards the hanger, she did stop for a few minutes to grab a tea from one of the little agent run kiosks along the way. Even with that it only took her just over fifteen minutes to get to hanger 12, she went up to a harried looking agent whose eyes widened when he saw the file she was holding.

“They really are looking everywhere for a new handler for Barton aren’t they?” He raised his eyebrows and held a hand out to her. “The names Coulson, Agent Phil Coulson. Honestly I still think I can handle him but I’m still a bit new and they’re not very trusting here.”

“So I’ve noticed.” Laura tucked Clint’s file under her arm and shook Agent Coulson’s hand. “How new is new?”

“Well new to being a handler, I’ve actually been part of S.H.I.E.L.D. since I graduated from college.” Agent Coulson shrugged. “Trained under director Fury himself actually.”

“As much as I would honestly love to hear you reminisce about a young Agent Fury, and trust me I would, we have a plane to catch.” Laura jerked a thumb towards where Clint was standing next to the ramp of one of the jets.

“Laura?” He frowned at her as she and Agent Coulson walked up. “I thought Hill banned you from seeing me off.”

“Not seeing you off.” Laura grinned and waved his file at him as Agent Coulson looked between the two of them confusion clear on his face. “Agent Hill is getting tired of your ability to chase off handlers so now you’re one of my special cases.”

“Hardly my fault-”

“You two know each other?” Agent Coulson interrupted.

“Intimately.” Laura grinned and Clint muttered something in a language Laura didn’t recognize, though she did recognize the way the tips of his ears turned pink.

“Oh.” Agent Coulson blinked a few times before shrugging and gesturing for Laura to head up the ramp. “Well, I’m sure Agent Hill has a good reason for this.”

Laura raised her eyebrows but lead the way up the ramp, honestly she’d expected a little more argument on that one. She could think of at least a dozen policies this mission was in direct contradiction of. The she saw the weapons box they’d set out in front of what was no doubt Clint’s spot and she stopped dead in her tracks. Coulson almost ran into her, Clint stepped around her as though he’d been expecting the reaction.

“No wonder.” Laura stepped up to the box and opened it to reveal a sniper rifle, a nice one, but all guns were loud at the best of times. She turned to Coulson letting the annoyance show on her features. “This doesn’t have anything other than your basic silencer on it.”

“No?” He was sitting by that point, looking confused once again. At this point Laura wondered if polite confusion wasn’t actually his default expression.

“Are you all idiots? I thought S.H.I.E.L.D. was supposed to hire the best?”

“Aren’t you living proof that that’s not all they’re looking for?” Phil raised an eyebrow but it had been a long time since that sort of thing got under her skin in public and she just waved a hand.

“Not a single one of your handlers thought that just maybe the gun causing feedback in his hearing aids was why he took them out?” Laura turned to Clint and held out her hand, his file with the target information and plan was in her hand by the time it had stopped moving. She skimmed it and met Clint’s eyes over the top of it. “You have your bow on you?”

“Technically no.” Clint said but he was already grinning, pulling pieces out and snapping it together.

“Perfect.” Laura nodded and tucked both of the files into a slot between seats as the jet started moving. She turned to Coulson, who was watching the whole thing with a rather bemused expression. “The drop spot should be more than close enough for Clint to use an arrow rather than a bullet, for future such things I would recommend a specialty bow, perhaps some trick arrows.”

“A quiver made so the arrows don’t fall out would be useful too.” Clint piped up from behind her.

“My work is pretty much done here, I’m sure you can handle it without my help.” Laura said but Coulson was already shaking his head.

“No, I’m not going to be the one explaining why the target was shot with an arrow.” Coulson patted the seat next to him and Laura sat down. “You’re coming with me to the debriefing and helping me argue this case.”

“Which to do you’ll need to know why.” Laura nodded. “First I gotta ask, what level are you?”

Coulson seemed almost to pause for a second while he considered her question. “Why?”

“I want to know what secrets you have access to.”

“Level six.”

“Huh.” She stretched and grinned at him. “In that case ask away, I’ll tell you anything I know about Clint, and why him using a gun is a stupid idea.”

“Of course they’ll listen to you.” She could hear the eye roll in Clint’s voice.

“We’ve all got to get credit for something.” Laura shot a grin towards Clint as he let out a sudden laugh. “You focus on your weapon, I’ll deal with the questions.”

As he chuckled to himself Coulson turned towards her with a thoughtful look. Then the volley of questions started and honestly it was almost nice dealing with someone who seemed to genuinely appreciate that she had knowledge.

The mission of course went flawlessly, as it turned out an arrow through the throat was just as effective as a bullet. The hostage was retrieved in one piece and delivered to an agent who would take them wherever they were supposed to go. Clint made it to his pick-up spot with time to spare and more importantly to why Laura was there didn’t turn his hearing aids off once.

The debriefing was a bit more of a gong show; apparently agents Hill and director Fury had decided that Laura’s involvement was need to know, and by need to know they meant they had told pretty much no one that they’d assigned her the file. Between her and Agent Coulson though they managed to argue their way into getting everything Laura figured they should have to equip Clint. Following that was a chewing out by Agent Hill that resulted in a strange shared custody of Clint between Agent Coulson, who was to be his handler from now on, and Laura herself, who was to oversee the paperwork and outfitting portion of it. It was honestly the ideal set up, leaving Laura mostly free to continue with her work, looking for exceptionalities in the cases that higher levels sent her way.

 

—

 

With the problem of Clint removing his hearing aids was solved, it didn’t take long until he rose through the ranks of field agents, complete with harder and harder missions. Being Clint, he completed most of them with the same sort of amused determination he’d used for his acts in the circus, emphasis on the amused. He had such a tendency to crack jokes and keep up running commentaries while on mission, that the only real complaint most of the paperwork about him had was that he didn’t seem to take any of it seriously. Laura was more inclined to think that most agents just didn’t have a sense of humor. She told agent Coulson as much after one mission had ended with an unfortunate amount of complaints from every agent involved.

S.H.I.E.L.D.’s solution to the problem was simply to start sending Clint on more solo missions, and on longer ones. His missions started lasting multiple days, sometimes weeks, though he did check in daily with both Laura and agent Coulson. Despite that Laura found it harder than she would have liked to deal with the empty apartment, which led to her spending most of her time at S.H.I.E.L.D. working on paperwork for both herself and the exceptionalities. Putting in the extra work had both pros and cons, which, despite how one might think of them, Laura found often stemmed from the same thing.

At first, her doing most (if not all) of the paperwork for the squad had upsides. The others were pleased to not have to do it themselves, higher ups were pleased that it was suddenly getting done on time, and overall the mood around their small office improved. Then the higher ups decided to show how pleased they were by giving her extra work, along with the promotion, title, and increased level that came along with that.

Suddenly Laura wasn’t just on the exceptionalities squad, she was in charge of it. She was a level five agent, promoted above the more qualified agents she worked with, in charge of sorting out who would work best with which agent they’d been assigned to look for exceptionalities in. All information for the squad went through her before it was passed to her agents or the higher ups. On top of that she was still working with the handlers, both on Clint’s case and on other problem agents they’d had to see if she had the same magic touch. She did however, refuse the offer of her own office. Several weeks into her promotion and she still hadn’t decided if that had been a good idea or not.

There was a thump as one of her agents, she didn’t bother looking up to see which one it was, dropped their pile of files very nearly on top of the file she’d been making notes on. Those were the little things that reminded her that her promotion had bothered the others, with the notable exception of Agent Brown who had finally re-found her sense of humor.

“See, this is why I told you to be careful.” Agent Brown herself said laughter dancing in her voice as she leaned on the side of Laura’s desk opposite where the files had been dropped from. “Or alternately you could have been ruthless, haggled for better office space, nicer hours, etc etc. Instead you’re still in here with the rest of us every day for longer days and you get more paperwork.”

“I turned down better office space actually.” Laura sighed looking up at Agent Brown with a sigh. “Can I help you or are you just here to learn to laugh again?”

“Oh I never stopped laughing boss.” Her grin was almost as warm as it was sharp as she handed Laura a small stack of files. “These are why I’m at your desk though, I can’t figure out anything exceptional about them, other than their exceptionally large egos. I think they should be fine to cycle back into the regular agent pool. Whoever is making a list won’t have use for them.”

“Thanks Brown.” Laura nodded tugging on her braid as she placed the files in her pile that she had to look over and send back out of the office.

“No prob boss.” Agent Brown glanced down at her watch and then grinned at Laura. “I’m off but bonus for you that means your boy should be calling in soon.”

“Yeah.” Laura glanced at her phone with a smile. She and Barton were almost as poorly kept a secret as S.H.I.E.L.D.’s existence. Much to certain people’s annoyance anyone who tried to bring it to the attention of the higher ups though was brushed aside. Laura was starting to wonder if the rumors of charity cases and favoritism had actually stopped after training, or just continued as they gained evidence. “Goodnight Agent Brown.”

“Night boss.” Agent Brown waved and headed out the door, most of the rest of the agents had either left already or were trickling out as they filed their reports.

Laura looked back down at her files and focused on sorting them as the rest trickled out, several more files only barely missing her hands as they were dropped onto her desk. She ignored any of the agents who didn’t want her attention on them, focusing instead on the piles she was trying to keep straight. One pile for files of agents who just needed to be cycled back in with the regular field agents, one for agents who seemed exceptional in some way, and another for agents who needed to be swapped between her agents to see if a different method would be more conclusive. Sorting the files into one of her three piles took more concentration than she would have liked to admit and before she knew it the room was cleared and hours had passed.

“No that can’t be right…” She frowned and checked the clock again, but no amount of looking convinced the clock to move backwards. It was nearing midnight and Clint, who checked in with agent Coulson at six and with her sometime after that, hadn’t checked in yet. It wasn’t like he was never late, but this felt like something else altogether. Laura shook herself and stood trying to ignore the heavy feeling growing in her stomach.

By the time she got back to the apartment she’d checked her cell phone at least a hundred times, waiting for a text or a call or anything. As much as she wanted to she knew better than to call him while he was on assignment. If he’d done what he was supposed to his cell would be in his locker at S.H.I.E.L.D. anyway and if it wasn’t then she could get him caught or worse by making it go off. She forced herself to lay down and try to get some sleep, but insomnia was closer than sleep on the best of days. Rather than getting restful sleep, she spent most of the night staring at the ceiling alternating between worry and anger. Sometime around four am she decided that she would go force information out of Agent Coulson or Hill or Director Fury or whoever knew more than she did in the morning. If that didn’t work she would go track down the idiot herself. After that she drifted off into a restless sleep that ended abruptly when her alarm went off two hours later.

Instead of going to her office when she got to S.H.I.E.L.D. she went straight to Agent Coulson’s. She didn’t even bother with knocking, just walked straight in and right up to his desk. She hadn’t even opened her mouth though, when he looked up at her, concern obvious on his face. “Have you heard from him? He never misses a check in, hell he’s hardly even late most of the time.”

“You haven’t heard anything?” Laura paced back and forth in front of Agent Coulson’s desk rather than sit in the chair, sitting seemed like a poor plan at the moment. “What was the last you heard?”

“Day before yesterday, he was getting close, or he thought anyway.” Agent Coulson gestured at the papers he’d been reading. “I’ve been looking over my notes from our conversation. I’m not allowed to even ask for an agent to send to look for him for at least another 12 hours, I doubt we’ll have anyone after him for at least another day, if not two.”

“Right.” Laura nodded and spun on her heel. Director Fury and Agent Hill were next on the off chance they’d decided to keep key information from the handlers, it wouldn’t be the first time, and then she was going to go after him herself. Her mind was already running over last known locations, tracking methods, and possible hints he’d leave her if he needed to.

By the time she walked into Hill’s office she had the structure of a plan in mind. Director Fury and Agent Hill both looked over at her as she walked in unannounced, Agent Hill was sitting at her desk and glaring at Laura, Director Fury had been pacing and was now turned and looking at Agent Laura like he couldn’t decide whether to be impressed or annoyed. She grinned at the two of them, all teeth and impatience. “Oh good you’re both here. What didn’t you tell me and Coulson about Clint’s latest assignment?”

“Agent Smith!” Agent Hill snapped the words, as though that would somehow make Laura obey protocols.

“That’s me, answer the question.” Laura glared back at her. “We haven’t heard from Clint in over 24 hours I need to know if there’s something you left out of the file before I go after him.”

“There’s nothing that is relevant to his mission.” Director Fury responded as Agent Hill’s face turned an interesting shade of red. “We sent him on an assassination mission to remove a highly trained agent who Hydra has in play. That’s all.”

“Fine, don’t tell me. I’ll figure it out myself.” Laura turned on her heel and headed out the door.

The trip back to her apartment she felt like she was waiting for someone was going to suddenly appear and try and stop her. The feeling really didn’t help the already lengthy trip seem any shorter. She ended up jogging the entire distance from the S.H.I.E.L.D. building’s entrance to her apartment. She let herself have a moment of being pleased that her training hadn’t worn off as she unlocked the apartment door.

Then she pushed the door open and the first thing she saw was Clint leaning on the counter of the kitchen looking like he was in pain. As soon as he saw her his hand lifted to his chest, already apologizing. The waves of relief, irritation, and anger all cut off abruptly as she followed he gaze to the couch where a small pale girl was curled up under a blanket, her red hair seeming even brighter against the dark material of the couch.


	8. Secrets, Ice Cream, and Bubbles, Oh My.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laura Barton meets the girl on the couch, has several conversions with Clint, and tries to help the girl adjust. Not necessarily in that order

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is probably the longest chapter I've written so I hope y'all enjoy that.  
> As always thanks to Lindy (rooish on tumblr) for editing, encouragement, and enthusiastic support of this fic! They're just the best.

 “What the hell Clint?” Laura practically hissed the words as she moved from the doorway to the kitchen, trying not to wake the girl on the couch. “You were sent after an assassin? Then you just don’t check in? Or call me? Or send any kind of signal that you’re alive?”

“That’s her.” Clint pointed at the girl and Laura looked between them. “That’s the target, my mission.”

Laura was silent for a moment as the implications of what he was saying sank in. “She’s a child.”

“There’s more like her, they’re all kids. Girls, actually.” Clint leaned back against the counter like it was the only thing keeping him standing. “She didn’t shoot. I was right in front of her but she didn’t shoot me.”

“The agents they were talking about... were children?”

“I’m not a child, I’m a weapon.” The girl’s voice was quiet but firm as she stared at Laura from the couch. Her red hair hung in loose curls to just past her shoulders and Laura could see how easily the girl would blend into a crowd. Then her face crumpled and she pressed the heels of her hands to her head. “My mission, the mission.”

“It’s okay.” Clint was by the couch before Laura could remind him that the girl had been sent to kill him. “You’ll be fine.”

“The weapon isn’t supposed to fail.” The girl looked up at Laura as she came to stand behind Clint and her eyes widened slightly. “You’ve been sent to bring me back.”

“I’m not part of this little one.” Laura knelt beside Clint so she was just below eye level. “Report, status.”

The girl blinked for a moment and Laura felt Clint stiffen beside her, she’d have to talk to him later. Then the girl’s eyes focused on Laura. “Unhurt, mission failed, ready for punishment.”

“No-” Clint started but Laura spoke over him.

“Why did you fail your mission?”

“I, the weapon,” she closed her eyes and took a breath. “The target didn’t have a gun, and he put down his bow. I was unprepared for the target to speak.”

“The target’s name is Clint.” Laura said gently, holding her hand out towards the girl. “I’m Laura. Do you have a name?”

She’d twitched when Laura said their names, then she pulled back, just enough for it to be noticeable, when Laura asked for hers. There was nearly a full minute of silence before she spoke. “Weapons don’t have names.”

Laura could feel Clint start to shake beside her so she touched his wrist and stood up. He followed her several steps from the couch and she pointed towards the door. “Go check in with S.H.I.E.L.D. tell them you completed your mission but couldn’t make the call or pick up point. Coulson will buy that. I’ll talk to her.”

He opened his mouth with an expression like he wanted to argue but she just shook her head.

“Go Clint. I’ll be gentle with her.” Laura crossed her arms. “Do you really want S.H.I.E.L.D. coming in here looking for you?”

“Fine.” Clint ran a hand through his hair. He stopped just short of the door. “But when I come back-”

“We’ll talk, I’ll explain.” Laura nodded and he left.

The girl was still perched on the couch, watching the two of them with a calculating expression.

Laura watched the girl for a moment before settling on the coffee table in front of her. “What happened to your handlers?”

“Gone.”

“Gone like they left or gone like they’re dead?”

“The target removed them first.” She pulled her legs up, still watching Laura closely. “Before he came for me.”

“Report, all of it please.” Laura settled her hands in her lap.

“The target was supposed to be after someone else, that’s what they told my handlers, what they told me.” The girl settled into the couch, speaking almost automatically. “I was to remove him when he was preparing to kill his target. My handlers were punishing me for disobedience when the target broke into our base. I, I was unable to stop him…”

“Unable? Did you not have a weapon nearby.”

“I had my handlers gun, I-” The girl’s face twitched, like she was fighting off a headache.

“You couldn’t shoot.” Laura nodded and stood, the girl flinched back and Laura felt something inside her break a little. “There’s no punishment coming, child. Just some tea for that headache.”

The girl watched her closely regardless, still not moving from her place on the couch.

“You can get up if you like, probably shouldn’t leave the apartment but I don’t see why you can’t look around.” Laura pulled out two mugs and set the kettle to boil.

“There are fourteen ways I could kill you from here.” Was the response from the girl but she did get up and walk to the kitchen, though she kept the island between the two of them.

“And about thirty more from that island.” Laura nodded and gestured to the kettle. “Do you know how to make tea?”

From the look on the girl’s face Laura figured she probably thought this whole thing was a test of sorts. To what end Laura had no idea. Though to be fair she wasn’t exactly wrong, Laura wanted to know if she could trust the girl to not kill them in their sleep. For the moment that seemed unlikely. After a moment the girl shook her head slightly and Laura smiled.

“Tea is pretty easy, unless you’re making it for someone truly picky.” Laura smiled putting a handful of different teas on the counter. “I usually make this one, it’s a rather plain black tea. Right now though, I think mint or licorice would be better. They’re good for headaches. Chamomile or ginger would be better of course, but I’m out.” Laura continued talking, low and soft as she made tea, a mix of her loose leaf mint and the licorice. She explained each step as she did it and why it was done that way, then put one of the cups on the side of the island closer to the girl and put sugar, honey, and cream between them. “I usually have a little honey in mine but you can mix yours however you like.”

The girl leaned forward to smell the tea and looked up at Laura, suspicion clear on her face.

“Don’t worry child, I didn’t do anything terrible to it.” Laura sipped her own tea and smiled. “There’s no more handlers now, no more punishments, and no more missions. All you have to do is not kill us.”

“No more missions?” The girl looked down at the mug of tea like it was a particularly hard puzzle. “Am I being decommissioned?”

“No, you just get to be a child rather than a weapon.” Laura smiled at her and walked back to the couch, sitting on one corner of it and picking up her book. “You got away from all of it.”

Laura started reading as the girl seemed to be thinking that over. It was several minutes until the girl moved from where she’d left her. She moved from the island to the other end of the couch, perching on the arm of it and watching Laura in silence.

“There’s books on the shelf behind you if you’d like to read also.” Laura said after she finished her page. “They did teach you how to read as well, yeah?”

The girl nodded slowly, moving from the couch to look at the shelf and then moving back again with a book. The two of them passed the rest of the day like that, reading on opposite ends of the couch.

By the time Clint got home the girl had curled up on her end of the couch and fallen into a restless sleep and Laura had moved to the bedroom so as to not wake her up accidentally. Laura looked up as Clint walked into the bedroom. “I told you that my parents had been grooming me for S.H.I.E.L.D. and their academy.”

“Laura it looked like she recognized you, like you were part of all of that.” Clint sat at the foot of the bed and looked at her, clearly working himself up to say what was on his mind.

“Part of Hydra? A Nazi?” Clint frowned when Laura said it but it was in the first page of the S.H.I.E.L.D. handbook, Hydra was started by Red Skull, a known Nazi. “I’m not, Clint. I know who she thought I was but I’m not part of Hydra. She’s hurting, and not likely to trust me anytime soon.”

“Who did she think you were?” His frown hadn’t left and Laura felt twisted.

“My sister.” Laura held a hand up when Clint opened his mouth, if he interrupted her she doubted she’d ever manage to tell him it all. “I was the youngest of three kids, our parents belonged to a group who came to America seeking asylum after the end of the war. The group said anything from they’d been forced to they’d just been following orders and hadn’t know, the American government offered asylum to dozens like them after the war. She thought I was Hydra because my parents are, because my siblings are. That’s why me getting scholarships and good grades and changing my name as a teen were rebellious, I got out.”

“Then the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who knew you as a kid are also...?”

“Not most of them.” Laura shook her head, she didn’t know how many, if any, of the other families had been part of Hydra. “I don’t know.”

Clint frowned down at the bed, hardly even looking at her.

“She’s from the red room.” Laura nodded towards the door of the bedroom. “Your assassin girl, I remember reading about it as a child. I’d gotten into my parents office, it’s how I found out about Hydra.”

“What?”

“The red room. It was started just after the war, after Captain America.” Laura closed her eyes dredging up the information she hadn’t read in years. “They were trying to remake him, or super soldiers like him anyway, but they didn’t want big muscled guys who stood out. They wanted assassins who would heal faster, learn faster, and go unnoticed. The file said it had been shut down but it had several different shutdown dates and dozens of locations, I assumed they just moved it everytime people found out.”

“Is anything I thought I knew about you true?” Clint asked when she opened her eyes again and Laura looked down at the blanket. It was a fair question really but it still hurt.

“I’ve never lied to you.” Laura said it quietly, not looking at him but keeping her face angled so he could see her lips. “I just left out most of my childhood, anything I’d been trying to leave behind. I didn’t get to pick my parents but I chose to leave.”

“Why?”

“I was selfish.” Laura glanced up to see Clint looking at her with a mix of confusion and hurt that did nothing at all to help the pain growing in her chest. “And how do you bring it up anyway? Oh hey by the way my parents and older siblings are Nazi’s, sorry Hydra is the term they prefer, or they were last time I talked to them anyway. It just puts people in danger, puts me in danger. I didn’t want to take the chance that it would put either of us in harm’s way.”

“Yeah not really a casual conversation topic.” Clint said quietly.

“I didn’t intend for you to find out like this.” Laura said quietly, holding her hands in her lap to stop herself from doing something, she wasn’t really sure what. “I was going to tell you, later, once I figured out how.”

Clint reached over and wrapped his hands around hers. “It’s done now, you left your family, I brought home an assassin…”

Laura laughed as he trailed off, apparently unsure of where he’d intended that sentence to go. “I think I’ll take a vacation, couple weeks off. I’m sure they can survive without me while I recover from whatever illness required I leave so early today.”

“They have another mission for me, an easier one this time apparently.” Clint shrugged moving so he was sitting beside her. “I’m supposed to leave the day after tomorrow.”

“We’ll figure this out.” Laura leaned against him. “She’ll be safe here.”

 

—

 

Clint and Laura were up early the next morning but the girl still beat them both to the punch; she was sitting up and reading when they left the bedroom. As Clint started making pancakes Laura called her office to let them know she’d be out a few days, having ‘come down with something’. It was all entirely civil. By the time she’d hung up Clint was nearly finished cooking the pancakes so she went over to the girl.

“Child the pancakes are almost ready, come eat.”

The girl looked up at her with a frown, like she didn’t quite believe her.

“Come on,” Laura gestured towards the table. “You’ve got to be hungry by now.”

“I’m taking mine to go, love.” Clint called from the kitchen. “Coulson wants a proper report from me so I should be on time, I’ll pass on the news of you being sick.”

“Thanks, good luck.” Laura met him by the door so she could kiss his cheek. As the door shut behind him she went back to the kitchen and lowered herself into a seat at the table staring at the pile of pancakes he’d left.

The girl sat across from her and stared, still looking like everything still might turn out to be a test.

“I need something to call you, a name.” Laura said after a minute or two of neither of them eating. She put a couple pancakes on a plate for each of them and put one in front of the girl. “I can’t just call you child forever.”

“Weapons don’t have names.” She repeated what she’d said the night before. “Names are for people and places, not weapons.”

“You’re not a weapon anymore, you’re a child.” Laura buttered her pancakes and coated them in syrup. “Children get names.”

The girl looked down at her pancakes like she might short circuit.

“You don’t need to pick right away. Just let me know when you figure it out.” She shrugged and started eating her pancakes. Names seemed like as good a place to start as any.

They spent the morning in near silence, finishing eating and then cleaning up the dishes. Hours later, once they were both settled on the couch and reading again the girl spoke. “Natasha.”

“Hmm?” Laura looked up from her book to find the girl staring at her with an expression that she couldn’t read.

“A name, my name.” The girl, Natasha, said with a nod. “The other girls called me, not the weapon, me, Natalia so Natasha would be appropriate.”

“Nice to meet you Natasha.” Laura smiled at her. “I’m Laura.”

“And I’m not a child, not by this country's standards.” Natasha said frowning slightly. “I’m eighteen, by this country's standards I’m an adult.”

“Huh.”

“My appearance is in part from the medicine, the serum they give us.” Natasha rubbed almost unconsciously at her arm. “Before and after every mission, it heals and…”

“Keeps you strong, keeps you complacent so they can mess around in your brain?” Laura asked quietly as Natasha trailed off.

Natasha frowned but didn’t argue the point, didn’t say anything in fact, just picked up her book again and kept reading. So Laura followed suit.

Much of the next week or so went the same. Once Clint was sent off on his mission Laura took over the cooking but that was the only major change. Aside from a trip to the grocery across the street that left Natasha shaking for an hour they didn’t leave the apartment. Most of their time was spent reading and watching shows, or in Laura’s case catching up on whatever paperwork she could do from her home laptop.

Occasionally Natasha would let drop information about her past, punishments and rules and not getting food to train them to go without. Every piece of information she let slip made Laura want to hunt down whoever it was who ran the red room and kill them in slow and creative ways. Instead she made cupcakes and watched the wonder on Natasha’s face as she ate them and got icing on her nose. Though that had nothing on Natasha’s expression when Laura brought home several cans of peaches and pears with their sticky sugar syrup. She wrote up a sheet of the few rules she and Clint had come up with and tacked them to the wall along with a list of acceptable punishments for breaking said rules, like getting stuck on dish duty or no more baked goods. She caught glimpses of Natasha frowning at the sheet out of the corner of her eye more than once.

The day before Laura had to go back to work, she stocked up on microwavable food and showed Natasha how to cook it. Natasha was entirely unimpressed with the whole thing, right up until she ate a pizza pop, she was a lot more pleased after that. Once Laura was sure that Natasha wouldn’t starve while she was at work she felt a much better about that fact that she would inevitably be spending most of her day at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters at least five days a week.

 

—

 

It was almost a week after Laura went back to S.H.I.E.L.D., on her first day off actually, that Clint cornered her in their room. Well, she was sitting at her desk and he perched on the edge of it. When he spoke his voice held that serious tone she hated hearing from him.

“Laura.”

“Yes?” She turned to look at him rather than the paperwork she’d brought home.

“How much of what you’ve told people about your past is actually true?” He picked absentmindedly at his fingers, a habit he still hadn’t managed to kick. “Was any of it?”

“All of it was true, but I never told all of it.” Laura took a deep breath and forced herself not to look down, it would be hard for him to read her lips if she did. “I told bits of truth and let people fill in the rest. Any part in particular?”

“The stuff about your dad, about dodging and broken glass.” Clint said. “The way you said it it sounded…”

He trailed off as she nodded. “I made it sound like it was the same thing, he tossed something that shattered when I dodged it. It wasn’t always like that. Dodging was one of the first things they taught us, a daily activity. We never knew where it would come from, but we always had to be prepared to block, fight, or dodge. It wasn’t unusual for them to leave broken glass around if we weren’t expecting company either, and it was always part of the obstacle courses we were expected to do whenever asked, either find a way around it or walk over it.”

As she spoke she watched Clint’s muscles tense and un-tense, like he wanted to hit something. Instead he took a deep breath. “What about throwing axes?”

“That’s true actually, I quite liked any weapons that could be thrown. It was one of the few training activities I enjoyed.” Laura smiled as she remembered warm summer afternoons out back of her parents estate on the rare times her parents weren’t watching her every move. “Throwing knives were a particular favourite of mine when I was younger, but throwing axes is usually the safer one to say. It’s at least actually a sport.”

“It is not.” Clint’s frown changed into one of disbelief as he watched her.

“It is too!” Laura shot back. “Like archery, it’s a sport that requires both strength and precision, there are tournaments.”

“You’re pulling my leg there’s no way!” He was practically laughing now as she opened up her laptop. “Throwing axes sounds like a ridiculous summer camp activity at best, not a sport.”

There was a soft knock on the door before Laura had a chance to respond and they both looked over to see Natasha standing there with a small frown, looking just a little confused. They both realized at the same time how loud they’d gotten in the last few sentences. “Laura is right.”

“Of course I am.” Laura grinned and gestured for Natasha to come in, and then towards her laptop where she’d pulled up a Youtube video of one such tournament. “See?”

“Well I’ll be damned.” Clint shook his head as the video played. Beside him Natasha’s fingers twitched like she was copying the motion in her head.

Over the next few hours they moved from the axe tournaments to archery ones to something that involved hitting each other and had Russian commentary. After that they drifted away from sports and took turns looking up videos to show each other, funny ones, music, cute animals, and everything in between. It wasn’t until Clint’s stomach made a protesting noise that they even realized how long it had been.

Dinner was just as entertaining as the videos had been with Laura and Clint cooking and Natasha perched on the counter watching like a hawk. They traded stories over the meal, Laura and Natasha contributed stories they’d been raised on (both fables and stories about S.H.I.E.L.D. in its early years with a slightly different slant than they’d been raised on) and Clint told stories of the circus folk (both on and off duty).

That night, once all the lights were off and the day was running through Laura’s head again, one of the many ways her insomnia kicked in, she reached over and tapped Clint’s shoulder.

“Hmm?” He rolled over to look at her, blinking the sleep out of his eyes.

“I wouldn’t lie to you.” Laura said it as quietly and insistently as she could.

“I know.” Clint brushed her hair back away from her face.

“Not purposely and not by choice.”

“So you could be persuaded then?” He said with a smile.

“To protect you, or her.” Laura nodded towards the door before it occurred to her that his smile was a joking one. “You were joking…”

“Yeah.” He chuckled, glancing towards the door. “I think she can probably protect herself.”

“Shouldn’t have to.” Laura glanced away from his eyes as she spoke. “You know the first time I saw her? This little kid with bright red hair curled up pretending to sleep on our couch? All I could see for a second was a thirteen year old with dark hair curled in the corner of her father’s study with her fists clenched so tight she would have red half moons on her palms for a week. I saw another little girl who’d managed to find a way out.”

“Technically she just let someone take her out.” Clint’s smile was gentle even as laughter danced in his eyes.

“How do you do that?” Laura reached out to trace the crinkles at the corners of his eyes. “Find a way to laugh about it all, always turn it into a joke?”

“One of my many gifts.” He shrugged reaching up to cover her hand with his.

“Hmm.” Laura made a noise of agreement before leaning close to press her forehead against his. It seemed more like a way to survive than a gift. Her thoughts trailed off as he shifted close enough to kiss her gently.

“You think too much, love.” Clint’s smile took on a wry twist as he pulled back enough to see her face.

Laura smiled tracing her fingers over his cheekbones. “So make me stop.”

 

—

 

“You were no one! They pulled you up from records, you didn’t even have proper training when you started!” Agent Benedict snapped the words out in a tone intended to sting. Laura remained in her seat with a carefully unimpressed look on her face, the look in large part due to the files Agent Benedict had tossed towards her which now lay scattered on the ground between them. “There’s no reason in the world you should have been promoted above the rest of us! We shouldn’t have to answer to you!”

“None at all?” Like her expression her voice was carefully controlled into sounding unimpressed, just barely bordering on curious.

“You’re young, inexperienced, unqualified, and uneducated.” They counted the reasons out on their fingers, Agent Benedict had always been one to gesture while they spoke. “The only reason you’re even here is that the higher ups like you.”

“So I suppose you also signed up for any extra course you could once you were hired? Just to learn anything they were willing to teach?” Laura asked the question in a tone that someone more foolish might have called warm.

“Well…”

“Did extra paperwork? Took on extra cases to help the team out?” She raised her eyebrows as they floundered. “Stayed late or came in early?”

“That’s not-”

“Read any files that you had access to that might come in handy to know? Asked for more courses on human behavior?” She tilted her head slightly, letting a small smile creep onto her face. “Arranged meetings with people who you can learn from? Added extra notes onto people’s files about how best to use them?”

“No but-”

“Then that’s why I have this position and you don’t.” Laura smiled and pointed to the files. “Last time I checked files belonged on desks, not on the floor.”

Agent Benedict practically ground their teeth together before kneeling to pick up the files. They dropped them in the box on her desk that was for files of possibly exceptional people that they were done interviewing. As they stormed back to their desk Laura typed up a quick report of the incident and sent it to Agent Hill along with a request that nothing be done about it.

“You’re not making any friends here you know.” Laura looked up to see Agent Brown leaning on her desk, a file in her hand.

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.” She said dryly holding a hand out for the file. “Found something?”

Agent Brown snorted but handed the file over. “That’s a strong maybe. The girl is young, maybe seventeen, though she insists she’s twenty two. My problem is I think they file is wrong, well not wrong exactly…”

Laura opened the file as Agent Brown trailed off and raised her eyebrows at what she saw, or rather what she didn’t see. “There’s almost nothing here.”

“Exactly.” She nodded and reached over to point at a few different spots. “No place of origin, only a guess for a birthday, three different names, and no family history.”

“This whole file is a series of guesses, followed by excuses for the lack. It might as well be blank.” Laura frowned and shut the file, no information seemed better than this honestly. In all likelihood that was why she’d given the case to Agent Brown.

“I was supposed to have a meeting with her in a few minutes, my third meeting, but I still have no information.” Agent Brown shrugged. “I don’t have any excuse she’s just good at talking in circles without saying anything. Could you watch?”

“In the room or behind the glass?”  Laura nodded and stood up, her paperwork could wait she wanted to know who could manage to stay inside S.H.I.E.L.D. without giving them any solid information at all.

“Behind the glass.” Agent Brown said it with a nod as they walked towards the room she’d set up in. She gave a little wave before walking through the door, leaving Laura to go into the little side room on her own.

Laura took her place behind the glass and looked out at the room Agent Brown had chosen. Unlike most of the rooms they used the one Agent Brown was using for this girl was made to feel comfortable, more like a lounge area and less like an interrogation room. There were two couches, some plants, a coffee table, a mini fridge with drinks and snacks, a handful of lounge chairs, and a scattering of books and magazines. Laura had never bothered using this one as most of the people she was assigned to talk to wouldn’t trust for even a second that the room was what it seemed to be, there was a reason they were assigned to her after all.

Five minutes later there was a knock on the door. Then a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent all but shoved in a girl who looked no older than fourteen before closing the door with a click that sounded more final than it should have. Laura frowned and made a disapproving noise, it was no wonder S.H.I.E.L.D. couldn’t get any information out of the girl. For half a second the girl’s eyes flicked towards the mirror and Laura wondered if the girl might have heard her. Then she focused on Agent Brown again and Laura chided herself for being foolish.

“Dr. Brown, I’m almost impressed that you’re here again.” The girl moved like a wild cat, slowly and with a strong sort of grace, pacing the room rather than sitting. Her movement contrasted with the absolute stillness Agent Brown was currently employing. “Most shrinks they assign me here don’t last past one session, let alone two.”

“I did tell you I’m not like most shrinks.” Agent Brown’s shrug was as graceful as ever. “You still haven’t told me your name yet.”

“I told you you could call me Eve, or Ella, or Sandy, hell you can give me another name if you’d like.” The girl shrugged and Laura frowned, the names sounded almost familiar.

“Well let’s start with something easier then.” Agent Brown tapped the file she’d put on the coffee table. “You and I both know this is a load of steam, was there any grain of truth to it?”

“There’s a grain of truth to every story.” Then the girl was suddenly in front of the mirror and Laura was wondering when exactly she’d blinked. “Isn’t that right?”

“What are you doing child?” Unlike Laura Dr. Brown seemed unimpressed by the display of speed.

“Not talking to you anymore Dr. Brown, I want to know who you brought along today.”

“You did hear me, interesting.” Laura said it quietly, just loud enough to test her theory.

“Of course I did, do you think I’m an idiot?” The girl crossed her arms looking almost offended. “Why are you skulking?”

“I’m not skulking, I’m observing or I was until you spoke to me.” She moved back from the glass as she spoke, heading out of the observation room, down the hall, and into the room Agent Brown and the girl were in. “How much did you hear?”

The girl was facing the door already when Laura opened it, an actual smile on her face, a small one but a smile nonetheless. “I actually had to listen for some of it.”

“So what’s your name?” Laura held out her hand.

“I wasn’t given one but they called me Eve.” The girl shook her hand an odd look on her face. “Were you given a name?”

“I’m Laura, it’s not the name I was given though it’s one I chose myself.” Laura opened the fridge and took out a water bottle, drinking from it herself before she offered it to the girl who nearly drained it in one go. “Have you chosen your name yet?”

“Haven’t decided.” The girl turned to Agent Brown her small smile returning. “I like this one, she asks clever questions.”

“She asked you the same question I’ve been asking you for three sessions.” Agent Brown had a look on her face that Laura couldn’t quite place, a little amused, a little pleased, and a touch of warmth Laura rarely saw in people’s faces.

“Same words different intent.” The shrug was back and the girl turned to Laura again. “She seemed like she knows already when she asks.”

“If I’m right, I know more about you than the file does.” Laura nodded though she really hoped she wasn’t right. “Maybe more than you do.”

“Well Ms. Clever, tell me what you think you know.” The girl bounced to the couches and dropped herself onto the one Agent Brown wasn’t sitting on.

Laura took a seat beside agent Brown and opened the file. She flipped the first sheet over and started sketching. She sketched three symbols as quickly and accurately as she could. Then she handed it to the girl, her face when she saw the sheet answered Laura’s question before she asked it. “How many of these were in the rooms you grew up in?”

“Those are…” Agent Brown stared at Laura as the girl looked at the sheet.

“Three of the symbols Hydra has used yes.” Laura nodded without looking at agent Brown or explaining why she knew the old versions of Hydra’s logo. “How many?”

“This one at first, then they moved me and it was this one.” She placed the paper on the coffee table to point at the symbols.

“That’d make you about sixteen, one of the first set of Eve’s.” Laura said quietly. “You were part of an experiment on toddlers to make super soldiers, after the attempts to change fetuses proved not as successful as the Hydra agents wanted no matter what they did to the serum or to the children, none of which I know of course as it’s all classified above my level.”

“Then how?” Agent Brown was still staring at her.

“I know a lot of things I’m not supposed to.” Laura smiled at her. “Like that the tape of this session will be corrupted and this one’s file will remain as confusing as it was when I walked in here. There are plenty of reasons I was promoted above the rest of you, just assume this is one of them.”

“If you know what I am why do you look so relaxed, Dr. Brown doesn’t even know the facts as she’s never relaxed around me.” The girl stared between the two of them.

“Because Dr. Brown sees someone unknown, and exceptionally strong. I see a child who never got to learn to be a child.” Laura’s smile was gentle. “I’ve also played through as many scenarios as you have, I know that unless you are very foolish you would never actually hurt me.”

“I could get away.”

“But you’re no safer out there than in S.H.I.E.L.D.” Laura shrugged and the girl stared with a look that Laura knew. It was the look that meant she’d let something slip that the girl already knew but everyone had been trying to hide from her. “Oh honestly, why they bother trying to pretend they aren’t S.H.I.E.L.D. I’ll never know, the logo and acronym are on everything short of being stamped onto every agent’s forehead.”

The girl snorted and Agent Brown looked at the file on the coffee table like she was hoping it would offer her several shots of caffeine.

“Now I have places to be, feel free to keep giving agent Brown the run around.” Laura stood up and headed for the door.

“Max.” The girl called out as Laura touched the door handle. “My name is Max.”

“Well, Max,” Laura said turning to smile at her before she opened the door. “Welcome to S.H.I.E.L.D.”

The girl nodded hiding a small smile and Laura stepped out of the door and headed back towards the office. Once she got there she typed up a new file for Max and printed it without saving, closing the document as erasing the file entirely. The hard copy she tucked into a folder and added to her locked drawer. Then she wrote a note for herself to talk to Hill about the nameless girl before going back to the paperwork she was supposed to be dealing with.

 

—

 

When the nightmare faded this time, all creeping fear and a soreness in her throat that she couldn’t quite place, Laura stared up at the ceiling and tried to reminded her lungs of how to breathe. Clint’s steady breaths gave her something to pace her own to and she was relieved that at least he got to sleep through this one. Once she felt steady enough to think she extracted herself from the bed gently so she didn’t wake him.

As she padded gently into the kitchen the clock on the stove told her it was not quite two am yet. Then out of the corner of her eyes she noticed something between the table and the window, and nearly had a heart attack before realizing that it was just Natasha. She was sitting on a chair and facing the window, her back pressed against the table. Laura set a pot worth of water to boil.

“You too?” Natasha’s voice was hardly louder than a breath but Laura could hear the layers to the question. She didn’t turn around while asking it but Laura didn’t need to see her face to understand that she wasn’t just asking about tonight.

Laura found herself nodding as the kettle boiled before she realized Natasha couldn’t see her. “This time the dream was paralyzing, layers of fear and hurt, hiding and hoping maybe this time it would work.”

There was a pause long enough that Laura was pouring a mug of nearly over-steeped tea before Natasha responded. “Hope?”

“Never quite managed to break me of that one.” She stirred in sugar and just a dash of milk. “It kept me going for a long time.”

“Hope is dangerous.” This time Natasha’s response was almost instant.

“Mmm.” Laura sank into the chair at the side of the table, her back to the wall and Natasha in the corner of her eye. “But to who in the end?”

“Liliya was the youngest of us. All born within a month of course but Liliya was the youngest.” Natasha’s voice took on a tone Laura hadn’t heard since she demanded the girl report to her when she arrived, like she was relaying information off a file. “Our group was the largest they’d had all at once, two sets of twins, four others, me, and Liliya. Rada, the oldest, always had extra crusts for days when everyone else had run out, but Liliya had stories. Liliya had stories of hope, freedom, and a place that wasn’t the red room.”

Natasha paused and Laura waited in silence, almost scared to ask what had happened to the girl filled with stories.

“The fights started when we were eight, whenever they decided they wanted to see us in action.” Natasha’s voice wobbled slightly on their age but continued in the same tone like reciting memorized information. “Two of us would be picked, they went into a room, and only one came out. Liliya and I were chosen when we were twelve, she wouldn’t even try to fight back, paralyzed by the hope that we wouldn’t have to. I made it painless for her.”

When it was clear Natasha was done speaking Laura nodded. “My parents had three children, my sister, my brother, and I. From the moment we were born they already had a plan for each of us. My brother was to get a respectable degree, join S.H.I.E.L.D. in his twenties and rise through the ranks of decision makers, and inherit the family estate. My sister was to get a degree that indicated just enough smarts that people would hire her and become a secretary, work her way through high profile circuits and pass information back to our family, possibly enter S.H.I.E.L.D. in her late twenties or early thirties in the same capacity. Then there was me, enough years younger than either that my way into S.H.I.E.L.D. would be well paved, I would get a degree, go to their academy, pass the tests, go wherever S.H.I.E.L.D. wanted me, make myself indispensable.”

“Easy.” Natasha’s voice was a soft sort of quiet again.

“Yes.” Laura nodded, she could hardly deny that in a game of who had the worst life she would lose. “It would have been an easy course, letting myself be a pawn until they needed me, but it wasn’t what I wanted. Not that that mattered much as a child. I ran the courses, learned to walk on shards of glass, got used to going hungry for any reason they decided, spared against siblings or dummies until my blisters had blisters, learned every weapon or tactic they could throw at me, and absorbed any language they’d let me learn.”

“How?” Natasha turned slightly, just enough that she could see Laura as well as the window.

“Carefully.” Laura chuckled as she looked at her tea, it had taken her years to get out of her parents house after she realized she needed to leave. “I did well in school, made friends with teachers, principals, visiting faculty members, and anyone I thought might be useful at some point. I mentioned dreams and plans to anyone who looked like they might mention me to someone with ties to high schools with dorms and subtle lines about my parents to anyone a nurse might question discreetly. I was fifteen when the first offer came, a prestigious pre-Uni school, a private high school really but it thought highly of itself. My parents were livid, me living under someone else’s roof? They wouldn’t stand for it. I had connections though, and very few possessions I cared about. By the time I was eighteen I’d changed my name, and had several aliases I kept updated just in case I should need a quick escape.”

“You were alone.” Natasha had turned towards her fully at some point during her story. Laura nodded and Natasha looked thoughtful for a second. “You’re not alone now.”

“No, I got lucky.” Laura nodded and stood to pour her second cup of tea, and one for Natasha. The sky was beginning to lighten and the conversation drifted to other things, books, languages, and the little things they had to hold onto when hope wasn’t quite enough. They swapped stories about scars and tactics alongside stories of small kindnesses and myths they’d learned.

Sometime between three and four am Laura made herself another tea and Natasha some hot chocolate. By five they’d broken out the cinnamon biscuits Laura kept above the fridge and the talk had moved on to calmer things like thoughts about the future, the weather, or the grocery list.

It was nearly six when Clint came out of their bedroom with a small frown on his face. The frown disappeared when his eyes landed on Laura and Natasha leaning towards each other over warm drinks, laughing about Laura’s circus stories. Laura almost expected him to interrupt but instead he just smiled and went to the kitchen and started the waffle maker heating up.

“You two want strawberries while you wait?” He asked from where he was rummaging in the fridge.

“Toss ‘em to me.” Laura twisted in the chair to catch the container Clint threw to her. She pulled off the lid and slid it towards Natasha. “So then Azure and Olive, the stilt walkers, come over and just scoop the toddler from where she’s screaming on the ground and hold her up in the air talking back and forth like they do, asking her if she can see her parents from here, or maybe they need to hold her higher do they? And soon the kid is giggling so hard she’s not even looking for her parent she’s just making them pass her back and forth up above the crowds heads.”

“By which point of course her mother had shown up in a right panic trying to figure out where the little one had run off to.” Clint finished the story as he reached over Laura’s head for a strawberry, planting a kiss on her cheek before heading back to the waffles. “I still can’t believe how quickly you befriended them, they hardly talked to anyone.”

“What can I say, everyone falls for my charms.” Laura shifted one shoulder in an almost shrug and winked at Natasha who let out a huff of breath that Laura decided counted as a laugh.

“And yet you picked me, amazing.” Clint made a tsking noise and now it was Laura who was laughing. “No accounting for taste.”

“How do you do that?” Natasha looked between the two of them confusion clear on her face.

“Hmm?” Laura tilted her head.

“That.” Natasha repeated gesturing between the two of them.

“That is why I fell for him, and not someone else.” Laura shrugged sending a smile in Clint’s direction despite the fact that he was more focused on the waffle batter than her at the moment. “He’s comfortable.”

Natasha made a thoughtful noise and put her chin on the table, watching Clint as he made their waffles.

Laura ate some more strawberries and watched him as well, wondering what Natasha saw when she looked at him. She wondered if Natasha had seen it in him too, that calm and kind center of his, or if she’d realized being around him felt just like what people described coming home like.

Then he turned around and caught them both staring at him. He chuckled and held up the plate of waffles. “I don’t know if I should be pleased or frightened but I can offer waffles if it’s the second one.”

Natasha’s face seemed to light up as Clint walked over with the plate and Laura couldn’t help but grin as well. “Probably pleased, but I’ll accept your offering of waffles anyway.”

“Good to know.” Clint said as he put the plate down beside the container of strawberries.

The waffles seemed to vanish off the plate as they ate; the strawberries had reminded Laura that she hadn’t eaten proper food since the afternoon before and she imagined they did the same for Natasha.

After their breakfast of waffles Clint announced his intention to go to the local gym. He needled Natasha into going with him with more ease than Laura would have expected given Natasha’s dislike of leaving the apartment. Laura took advantage of the quiet to get some reading done, between working at S.H.I.E.L.D. and living with Clint and Natasha she hadn’t had much time for books.

She’d almost finished up the book she was reading when the door opened and the two of them walked in. Clint was grinning but Natasha’s quiet smile was what caught Laura’s eyes first. It was still a rare occurrence to see her actually smile.

“The punching bag never stood a chance against Nat here,” Clint said by way of greeting, ruffling Natasha's hair as they headed towards the couch. Natasha rolled her eyes at Laura and Laura just grinned back, they both knew that nothing without training really stood a chance against either of them.

 

—

 

Clint was out on a mission that required zero contact and had been for almost a week now. So on her way home from S.H.I.E.L.D. Laura swung by the little grocery and bought a large container of mixed berries. Angelica was working the till that day, cracking jokes about the weird weather they’d been having and tossing barbs back and forth with Eric while he restocked the isles. Watching them work was a nice reminder that despite they way her life had turned some people still had completely normal lives. So she hung around a while, chatting with them and people watching from her old spot on the step.

By the time she headed back to the apartment she was calmer than she had been in days. “Sorry I’m late, I brought berries.”

Natasha looked up from where she was curled on the couch with a novel Laura had found in its original Russian years ago and carried through a dozen lives.

“For a snack.” Laura held up the container as she headed for the kitchen.

Natasha padded over and settled herself in one of the chairs, staring at the berries as Laura washed them and dumped them into a bowl.

“I’ve always thought berries tasted a bit like freedom, like summer you know?” Laura put the bowl down on the table and sat across from Natasha with a smile.

“Freedom.” Natasha said the word like she was testing it out, then she picked up a raspberry and smiled at it like they shared a secret. “These taste like being in control.”

Laura popped a raspberry in her mouth and to her it still tasted like summers, like hiking to far and to fast, like being properly alone for the first time, but she nodded anyway because she got a feeling it was the same sort of thing anyway.

“I used to find them in the forests.” Natasha continued quietly picking around everything else to get just the raspberries. “When we were supposed to be training, hunting each other, and they hadn’t fed us in weeks. It was a mission, we were supposed to be focused on the goal only but I’d eat them anyway.” She paused and looked at her fingers, already turning red with berry juice. “One day they noticed the dye on my finger tips, I hadn’t washed it all off, the next time they sent us to the forests all the nearby bushes had been dug out.”

“They…?” Laura trailed off, not quite sure how to phrase the question.

“I proved their serums and their chairs didn’t work, not like they wanted them to.” Natasha tapped her fingers gently on her arm. “They hurt and they could twist our brains and mess with memories but I could still get control back, not always, usually the protocols and the trigger words dulled my mind and pointed my hand like they were intended to.”

“Mind control.” She nodded staring at the berries.

“That’s how I got this.” Natasha tapped at a spot on the back of her wrist, thin white lines criss crossed each other so small Laura hadn’t noticed them until now. “They sent me on missions, pointed my hand and my gun at targets. Sometimes I was able to control myself, I scratched faces there so I wasn’t entirely theirs, wasn’t just their deadly ballerina.”

Laura ate some berries and held her emotions away from herself, it wouldn’t help anything right now to show anger or upset.

“As we got older the punishments for disobedience got harsher and I did as instructed.” Natasha spoke quietly, like the weight of the words made them harder to say. “Even when the things they told us to do got harder, like when they told us to stop helping each other. Rada had always been terrible for helping, kept extra food and scraps for anyone who ran out too quick. They caught her sneaking food to the class below us once, they made an example of her, had me make an example of her.”

“How?” Laura asked quietly, somehow it felt like she had to ask.

“Knees first so she couldn’t run, then her hands so she’ll never use them to give away food again.” Natasha flexed her fingers before taking more raspberries. “They had Liliya burn the bed, everything Rada had worked so hard to stockpile, while Rada sat with her injuries nearby. The only time I disobeyed after that was…”

“When you didn’t kill Clint?” Laura watched as Natasha nodded. “Thanks for that by the way.”

“You’re welcome.” Natasha attempted a smile but it fell a bit flat, her mind clearly still caught in her past.

There was silence for a few minutes until Natasha started talking again, telling Laura bits of her past in that halting voice like her words felt to heavy. Not for the first time Laura found herself wanting to hunt down the Hydra agents responsible and tear them limb from limb as slowly as possible. Despite that she asked questions when Natasha paused, tried to help her piece together the parts that Hydra had mushed up in her mind. With every story Laura felt guilt and rage twist a little more in her gut. She also made a note to pick up berries as often as possible.

 

—

 

After a spring made almost entirely of thunderstorms summer appeared quite suddenly and with the heavy kind of warmth that meant it was going to be long and hot. On one particularly hot day Laura looked up from her pile of paperwork to where Clint and Natasha were playing chess, or rather Natasha was playing and Clint was losing spectacularly. “We need to go get frappuccinos and ice cream.”

“To the park then?” Clint said knocking over his king. “There was no way I was winning this game anyway.”

“Are you coming Nat?” Laura asked, it was Clint that had started the nickname but it had stuck pretty quick. “There will be a lot of people.”

“Frappuccinos are worth it.” Natasha nodded pulling on a black ball cap she kept at the front door. “And I haven’t tried ice cream yet.”

“Laura!” Clint stared at her with wide eyes that had Laura chuckling before he even started his sentence. “We’ve been neglecting her!”

The look Natasha gave Clint was almost as amused as it was confused, Laura hoped that was because she was starting to realize that Clint was actually a huge dork 90% of the time.

Their first stop once they left the house was Starbucks for their drinks. Both Natasha and Clint ordered ridiculous things with about twelve extra shots of caffeine or flavour, Laura stuck to a drink that could be ordered directly off the menu and didn’t taste like a heart attack. It wasn’t until they were walking through the park, the best ice cream place nearby was on the far side of it, that they realized what they’d really neglected to show Natasha.

“What are those children doing?” Natasha pointed and Laura stopped dead in her tracks as she looked over at the two shrieking children Natasha had pointed at. “Is it some kind of hand eye coordination training?”

“Bubbles, Clint we never showed her any kid stuff!” Laura spun and pointed a finger at Clint. “This is entirely your fault, you are supposed to be the childish one.”

“What’s my fault?” Clint looked between Natasha, who was shrugging, and Laura who just pointed towards the children as their guardian blew another stream of bubbles for them to chase. “Bubbles?”

“I’m still confused.” Natasha said looking between the two of them for a moment before turning to look at the kids.

“It’s bubbles.” Laura shook her head and started walking towards the guardian and the two kids. “I know the perfect person to explain!”

Natasha and Clint exchanged confused looks behind her back but followed her regardless.

“My friend here has never seen bubbles before so I have a big favour to ask of you guys, could you explain to her what they are?” Laura asked the kids, kneeling slightly so she was just above their eye level.

“Mama!” The older of the two turned to look at their guardian with an almost scandalized expression. “She don’t know what bubbles are!”

“You gotta blow slow like this.” The younger one mimed blowing bubbles for Natasha with a big grin. “And then you can chase em and pop em!”

“Or see who’s bubble lasts the longest!” The older one chimed in.

“Or goes up most!”

“Or you try and pop each other’s bubbles fastest!”

“I think you two are overwhelming the poor girl.” Their guardian laughed blowing a stream of bubbles which the kids went chasing after with shrieks that barely passed as laughter.

“So what’s the point?” Natasha was frowning slightly as the kids chased after the bubbles, both trying to jump high enough to catch one that had been picked up by the wind.

“It’s fun!” Laura grinned and then turned to the rather bemused looking adult. “Thank you!”

Once they were far enough away to be out of earshot Clint started snickering. “Yeah I’m the childish one.”

“You are.” Laura grinned bumping her shoulder against his. “And we’re buying bubbles next time we’re at a store.”

“Why?” Natasha was walking backwards in front of them so she could see their faces.

“Why not?” Clint shrugged.

“Because it’s fun!” Laura said with a grin at the same time.

At the ice cream shop Laura got her favourite maple and walnut ice cream, Clint got some technicolour bubble gum thing, and Natasha tried a tiny bite of almost all of them before settling on red velvet. They got them in cups to go and ate them on the walk back to the apartment. Once they got back Natasha spent the next hour or two with her back pressed into a corner and her nose buried in a book, but all in all Laura figured the trip counted as a success.

 

—

 

“You want to promote me? Again?” Laura stared at agent Hill, trying to decide whether they loved her or hated her. Really either one could explain the promotions at this point. “You put me in charge of this group less than a year ago.”

“It was really more of a trial period than anything else.” Agent Hill shrugged. “You seem intended for big things Laura, of all our candidates for this job you did the best.”

“Based on what?” Her voice came out sharper than she’d intended, it wasn’t that she didn’t want this or think she was good enough she just wanted to get the job for the right reasons.

“Your team is the most efficient one we have, when we set up the exceptionalities squads we set up several.” Agent Hill explained it with a wave of her hand like it was hardly important at this point. “Your team sorts them fast but effectively and you personally add notes to every case file. You aren’t afraid to step in if one of your people isn’t doing what they should but you also still trust them to do the work without and hand holding. It’s one of the reasons every one of them respects you even if they don’t all like you.”

Laura snorted at that. “Have you actually talked to any of them?”

“All of them.” Agent Hill said it with such authority that Laura found herself raising her eyebrows. “Most of your agents simply respected you as their leader, one or two didn’t like you but admitted that you do more work than anyone else, and Agent Brown gave you a glowing recommendation. She would willingly follow you into the deepest depths of the ocean, her words not mine.”

“Agent Brown hates the ocean.” Laura said it without thinking before the weight of those words truly sank in. She felt the flare of anxiety in her chest and took a deep breath. She couldn’t afford to have a panic attack about her parents right now.

“She trusts you, likes you even, and she’s picky. That’s why we put her in the squad with you.”

Laura nodded a few times focusing on Agent Hill’s words and forcing her fists to unclench. “What would this promotion entail?”

“More paperwork, less hands on, like most promotions unfortunately.” Agent Hill sounded genuinely remorseful about that which was curious enough that Laura was able to grab onto that emotion and shove the anxiety back into its box. The idea of Agent Hill in the field was honestly an interesting though, Laura figured she’d be terrifying. “As I said earlier we have several teams like yours, interviewing and testing people to see if they’re exceptional and where we can use them. We want them to work together, so we need a leader for the whole operation.”

“Someone had to have already been doing that.” Laura frowned, it was what she was doing now on a larger scale deciding which team would suite which case rather than just which person and what tests.

“I was, but I’m needed elsewhere. We need someone we can trust in charge of it all.” Agent Hill frowned at the paper in front of her. “And I mean all of it not just figuring out what and who but also where. You’d have agents and missions, we need someone in charge of people like Clint and the handlers of people like him, exceptionalities that we send into the field alone. We need someone calling the shots.”

“Tell me everything.” Laura leaned forward, if she was going to take the position (and she probably would), she needed to know all of it.

Agent Hill took a breath and nodded. “Right now it’s a mess, exceptionalities have existed for at least as long as S.H.I.E.L.D. but until recently there’d been so few we were aware of it hadn’t mattered. With Fury as director suddenly we’re finding them everywhere, you and Clint, and dozens of others. Not everyone is as exceptional as Captain America, but some people are coming close. The more of them we can get into S.H.I.E.L.D. and keep here the better off everyone will be. You can make people trust you and you seem to have a sixth sense for where people will fit, not a single one of your suggestions has been wrong. We created the squads quickly, they’re disorganized and rough. With you in charge you can pull it all together, deal with the case files, the people, and the missions all in one place. You’d be entirely in charge of it, level 8, and with the power to move people around as you see fit, promote as needed, and even fire and hire if you have to.”

“Huh.” Laura said as Agent Hill shrugged, entirely out of words now it seemed. “So Director Fury is pulling in exceptionalities and you have nowhere to put them.”

“Nowhere that’s good enough.” Agent Hill shook her head. “Putting them in with regular agents causes fights and resentment, sending them out on their own is dangerous, and not using them isn’t an option.”

“I’ll do it.” Laura nodded and the part of her that still measured all of her actions against what her parents would have wanted was simultaneously thrilled and appalled. She’d done it, she was trusted by and indispensable to S.H.I.E.L.D., but she’d done it for herself.

“Good, we can start tomorrow. For now here’s the basics.” Agent Hill handed Laura the thickest file she’d ever seen. “That’s what I’ve got on the groups I’m trying to pull under one umbrella, the names of the agents involved have everything you need to find them in the system if you want to get a better idea. Hopefully we can shift everything around with minimal disruption by the end of this month.”

“That’s ten days, Agent Hill.” Laura looked at her over the edge of the file she was already reading.

“Yes?”

“We’ve got a lot of work to do.” She looked down at the file and sighed, there went any free time for the next few days. “Let’s get started then.”

 

 

—

 

It was a sleepless sort of night so Laura was already making hot chocolate when she heard a muffled yelp and a string of Russian so garbled she couldn’t begin to guess at what it meant.

“Nat?” She was at the couch in seconds with her hand on Natasha’s shoulder, a move she hadn’t thought through before doing it.

“остановить, оружие не означало.” Natasha’s hand was around Laura’s wrist and she was on her feet before she was even truly awake. Her expression didn’t hold an ounce of anger, just fear.

“It’s okay, Nat ты дома, ты безопасен. You’re at home. You’re safe, все в порядке.” Suddenly the twist of guilt and anxiety in her gut was more than she could stand. “I’m sorry, I didn’t help sooner, I’m so sorry.”

“Я в порядке, мне очень жаль.” Natasha muttered and immediately released Laura’s arm. Her hands went to rub at her face instead. “I’m sorry, I’m fine now.”

Laura nodded and headed for the kitchen to make hot chocolate, the good kind, with milk and not from powder. Once it was made she grabbed their bag of tiny marshmallows and joined Natasha at the table.

“Why?” Natasha asked quietly. Laura raised an eyebrow slightly at the question so Natasha elaborated. “You apologized, why? All you did was try and wake me up.”

Laura was shaking her head before the question was finished. “I knew, I knew about the red room for years and I didn’t do anything. I felt like I couldn’t.”

“You knew?” Natasha’s eyes flicked from her mug to Laura’s face and back again. “How?”

“I went into my father’s study when I was thirteen, just barely into adolescence. They’d gone out to a function I wasn’t invited to, and I wanted to know why he wouldn’t let us into the study unless he deemed us good enough.” Laura tapped a sporadic rhythm onto her mug as she felt anxiety and guilt settle into her stomach. “His desk was locked but I learned to pick locks quite young. It was almost too easy. I wasn’t prepared for the Hydra files I found. I didn’t know about Hydra yet, not really, just that it was a group my parents were part of. The red room was one of the files, several groups of girls, trained and raised as ballerinas, as killers, as assassins, as weapons to be pointed.”

“We didn’t get names.” Natasha said it quietly. “We weren’t supposed to be people, just weapons who looked like people. We gave each other names in secret, when we got old enough that we realized what they were.”

“I was thirteen and I’d grown up hearing about S.H.I.E.L.D. and Peggy Carter, and that Rogers boy. My parents spoke about them like they were something to look down on, but no matter how they phrased it, Peggy Carter seemed like the kind of person who might listen, who might really see me. So I tried to go to S.H.I.E.L.D.” Laura said quietly. “Of course Agent Carter had long since stopped being director at that point. The new director was a man who saw a child who’d heard one to many stories about the war.”

“They didn’t listen?” Natasha frowned, looking at her mug like it might give her an answer.

“Didn’t believe me, their files said the red room had been shut down years ago, that it and everything in it had been destroyed.” She shrugged and looked at her mug. “My parents were furious when they realized I’d been into the study, but I made sure they didn’t hear about my trip to S.H.I.E.L.D. They just tried to up my training, tried to make me realize, make me understand, and I realized I had to get out.”

“What did they do?” Natasha asked quietly and Laura found herself surprised by the question. Natasha seemed to take her surprise for confusion. “To make you understand.”

“Brainwashing.” The pattern Laura was tapping out on her mug got more erratic still. “They signed me up to be a test subject for one of their Hydra friends, to find the best way to brainwash or mind control people into helping them, obeying Hydra. They were trying to do so without the torture and the mind melting drugs.”

“You ran?” Natasha guessed sipping from her own mug.

“No, I studied.” Laura shook her head again. “I threw myself into school work and excelled far above what they wanted me to, I continued to break into my father’s study and go over Hydra notes when they were out, and I made nice with teachers and counselors and anyone who might help.”

“Why?”

“It was an adult’s world.” Laura shrugged and sipped her hot chocolate, letting the warmth of it wash away some of the anxiety she felt bubbling within her. “I was only barely a teenager, even regular adults had more power than I did. Somehow I managed to avoid having the brainwashing work on me, I got lucky, and by fifteen I’d been offered the scholarship to a prestigious pre-university school, a high school really. It would cover grades 11 and 12 and there were dorms on campus, I accepted immediately.”

Natasha frowned for a moment before shaking her head. “They came after you.”

“They tried.” Laura nodded, it didn’t surprise her that where Clint had simply nodded and accepted what she’d said Natasha wanted details, especially now. “As soon as I got to the school I started building my shield; I went to the councilor and let them think they were convincing me to tell them my fears and hopes. I told them mainly fears about my parents and how they were furious they could no longer control me, how I was worried they might try and pull me out of this school, and I fed them any hopes they wanted to hear. All of them lined with the ability to escape my parents. The most important part was that I started wearing clothes that let them see the scars and the fading bruises from my training.”

“That worked?”

“It gave my parents too many layers of red tape to get through, gave me two more years to plan.” Laura said with a small smile, in a way her parents had been an instrumental part of how she escaped them. “By the time I graduated I’d made a dozen different lives online and as soon as I left the school I changed my name, got a dozen ids, one for each of my lives I’d created. Then I picked one and went to university with it, moved to New York, and kept a low profile while keeping up my other online lives.”

Natasha was quiet, sipping her hot chocolate and nodding when Laura finished. She seemed to be out of questions for the moment.

“I am sorry though, even once I was out I never tried to do anything about all the information I’d gathered.” Laura apologized quietly. “I never tried again.”

“You had no reason to endanger yourself.” Natasha shook her head and reached out to touch Laura’s arm gently,  like she wasn’t certain of the protocol. “It’s in the past now, nothing you say changes that.”

Laura nodded and patted Natasha’s hand. They finished their chocolate in silence and when it was done Natasha shifted like she was settling into the chair for the night so Laura tugged gently on her hand. “Clint’s still out on a mission, there’s plenty of room in the bed if you’d like?”

Natasha frowned for a moment, like she refuse, before nodding and following Laura to her room. Once they were both tucked into the bed Laura said goodnight and turned so her back was facing Natasha, a silent show of trust. Before she entirely lost consciousness she felt Natasha press their backs together.

 

—

 

Laura wasn’t sure at first what it was that had woken her, the sun wasn’t quite up yet and at first the apartment seemed quiet. Then she heard a string of quiet but annoyed sounding Russian and the smell of burning reached her nose. She rolled out of bed and tucked her feet into her slippers before heading to the kitchen. The sight that greeted her startled a laugh out of her before she could stop it. Patches of flour dotted the kitchen along with clumps of batter in varying consistencies, the box of pancake mix on the counter looked like it had been gouged open with a knife, and in the center of it stood Natasha scraping something that was both mostly batter and completely burned off of the pan and into the garbage can, muttering under her breath in Russian the whole time.

“I-” Natasha cut herself off and stared up at Laura looking like a deer in the headlights. “I was going to clean, I promise.”

“It’s okay Natasha.” Laura started and then lost her battle against the laughter again and started shaking her head.

“I was trying, Clint usually makes breakfast and…” Natasha trailed off looking down at the pan and then at the mess around her. As Laura took several deep breaths to stop her laughter Natasha started to smile, a proper genuine smile, honestly Laura could have cheered.

“Thank you.” Laura walked over to lean against the island.

“You’re welcome?” The look she gave Laura would have best been described as bemused. “I’ll try to make a huge mess more often.”

“Do you want me to teach you?” Laura gestured at the bowl of batter. “I can show you how to make maple and cinnamon pancakes.”

“Anything’s gotta be better than this.” Natasha held the pan out towards Laura with a sigh.

Laura examined it for a moment before shrugging. “You just have the heat a bit high, first time I made pancakes they tasted like sawdust, and were only slightly softer than rocks.”

“Really?” Natasha raised an eyebrow, her mouth twitching up into what Laura had realized was what passed for a laugh from her. “How?”

“Made them with basically just flour and water and left them in the pan on low heat for entirely too long.” Laura chuckled as she remembered trying desperately to figure out where she’d gone wrong. “Turns out too careful is a thing you can be when cooking.”

“Trade you.” Laura held out a cloth towards Natasha as she reached for the pan. “You wipe down the counters, I’ll clean this,and  then I can show you how to make the best pancakes.”

“The best huh?” She said with a smirk as she set to work getting the flour off the counters.

“Mhmm. Though Clint’s are good too I suppose.” It only took minutes to get the kitchen back into working order. After which Laura checked the batter and nodded. “Well, this is mostly the right consistency so you got that alright. Now to make them the best!”

Natasha nodded and hopped up onto the counter for a better vantage point for watching Laura cook. Laura pulled maple extract, the good kind, and ground cinnamon out of the spice cupboard.

“Right, so, basically we just add as much of these as we like,” Laura said pouring probably more of each than was wise into the batter, then tossing a bit more of the pancake mix in. “And add a bit of extra for a better consistency. Then just a scoop of batter for each pancake, like so, keeping the heat on about a medium so we’re not over or under cooking them. Then once the bottom starts to go golden you flip them.”

“You make that all look easy.” She glared at the pancake Laura had just flipped like it had personally wronged her.

“I have about four or five years on you, not to mention that I’ve been cooking for myself for about seven.” Laura chuckled poking the pancake over so she could start another one. “You just have some catching up to do that’s all. If it makes you feel any better you can probably beat me in a physical fight.”

“There’s at least four ways I could kill you without moving from this counter.” Natasha said by way of answer, then dropped down from the counter as Laura handed her the spatula.

“Good, your turn to cook.”

Natasha approached the task with a kind of concentration Laura tended to reserve for things like imminent death and exam prep. In the end they made so many pancakes that they spent most of the day snacking on them.

The next day when Laura got home from S.H.I.E.L.D. she found Natasha curled up around Clint’s laptop watching cooking videos on YouTube. The videos prompted a whole slew of experiments into cooking that lasted until they ran out of food for Natasha to experiment with. Which led to Laura’s favourite side effect of Natasha’s new interest in cooking, trips to the grocery store prompted fewer panic attacks. The interest in the food apparently overcoming the panic about open spaces and people she didn’t know.

 

—

 

Laura had been browsing apartment websites for the better part of the last year, pretty much since Clint had brought Natasha home, but apparently the idea of moving hadn’t occurred to either Natasha or Clint based on the looks of confusion she seemed to be getting.

“You want to move?” Clint asked, again, like he hadn’t understood the last three times.

“Well, yeah. This place is to small for all of us.” Laura accompanied her words with signs this time just on the off chance he’d actually missed what she said, pointing around her, miming walls, and then bringing her hands nearly together like she was squishing something.

“You don’t have to move.” Natasha spoke up for the first time since Laura had brought up the topic, her expression vaguely thoughtful. “I can go somewhere else, I didn’t mean to-”

“No.” Laura shook her head, automatically reaching out like she might need to catch Natasha. She pulled her hand back and shook her head again. “No, this place was never really meant for more than one person anyway and between our two S.H.I.E.L.D. salaries we make more than enough to afford a bigger apartment, with two bedrooms, a good kitchen, and a little more room to stretch out.”

Clint seemed at a loss for words, staring at Natasha like she’d just grown three extra heads.

Natasha looked from Laura to Clint and back again before speaking. “Why?”

“Because we like you and you need people, support. We’re able to help you in ways I only wish people had been able to help me when I was your age, or a bit younger really.” Laura looked down at her hands for a second before forcing a smile onto her face. “Plus the lease is up on this place soon anyway”

“When you left your family..” Natasha nodded then frowned slightly at Laura. “Two bedrooms? I don’t need my own room.”

“You deserve your own space.” Clint kicked the back of his heel against the couch. “Besides it would stop me from keep accidentally sitting on you while you’re sleeping.”

“And it’ll give you somewhere to put your things.”

“My things consist of six outfits and a container of bubbles.” Natasha pointed out one eyebrow raised slightly.

“We can fix that too.” Laura nodded and pointed at her laptop again. “Now you two help me figure out which apartments we want to take a look at please.”

For the two weeks that followed Laura spent most of her time, when she wasn’t at S.H.I.E.L.D., looking through housing sites and booking viewings at ones she liked the look of. Natasha came to most of the viewings and asked questions that made the people showing them around raise their eyebrows. Clint came to one but didn’t come after that as his only real opinion was that he wanted there to be a roof and windows.

In the end, Laura and Natasha settled on a two bedroom apartment that had a large open area as soon as you walked in, the left of which was the kitchen and the remainder was a mix of dining and living space. The two bedrooms were on either side of the apartment and each had its own bathroom. The guy showing them around was clearly trying to make the less than stellar neighborhood and lack of shared storage spaces seem like a good thing but as neither of those things bothered Natasha and Laura much they decided it was the apartment for them.

Of course once they moved in Laura realized they really needed to go shopping for Natasha, particularly for furniture.

 


	9. The Act of Living

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clint, Laura, and Natasha continue along the winding path they've set off on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge shoutout to Lindy continuing the seemingly unending task of editing this fic and a huge shoutout to anyone who's actually reading it as well!

CHAPTER 9

 

“We can’t allocate-”

“Listen, Agent Anders right?” Laura cut him off with a wave of her hand. “When Agent Hill and I created the exceptionalities division, it was director Fury himself who agreed on the amount of funding we were allocated. Unless that changes, and I will know if it changes, then I can and will allocate those funds where I see fit. That includes putting more funds into Psyc and Neurosci than into Security.”

Agent Anders drew himself up to his full six and a half feet like he thought that might actually do something. “But-”

“Feel free to take it up with the director, Agent Anders. Door’s that way, otherwise sit down.” Laura gestured towards the door. She hadn’t yet felt the need to stand up, though Anders had been on his feet for nearly five minutes now. He sat down with a look on his face like he’d just swallowed arsenic. “Unless anyone else has a pressing concern about where I’m using the funds, I’d like to continue this meeting please.”

“Just one question, love.” Agent Brown held up a hand, between the familiarity and her laugh lines she’d managed to half convince the other departments heads she was a rather kindly grandmother. Laura nodded for her to ask. “Why so much into training? Most of the Agents we get have already been through the academy plus regular military or have proven themselves exceptionally skilled.”

“The training they already have prepares them to work in a team, specifically a permanent team.” Laura shrugged. “Most of the missions that get sent our way require only one or two exceptional Agents, or require Agents to bounce between several teams. We need them ready for anything.”

Agents Coulson and Martinez nodded while Agent Anders frowned at the desk.

“Well then onto our next issue.” Laura tapped the stack of papers on her desk. “The number of transfer requests sent to me per day. I know we’re still new and people are just figuring out where they fit but it’ll never settle if I’m constantly moving Agents around. Which is why I’m not moving them around. I put people where they are for a reason, let things settle so you can see why before deciding that they need to move.”

“We’re barely a month in and there have been seven complaints about Agent Benedict’s style of leadership.” Agent Martinez frowned looking at the stack like she might be able to pinpoint that particular transfer request. “Even if you move no one else-”

“That’s why they’re answering to you Agent Martinez,” Laura smiled and spread her hands. “You’re supposed to look into the complaints and help them settle into their role, provide guidance.”

“They won’t-”

“They will listen because you will make them,” She shrugged. “You’re in charge remember? There will always be someone who disagrees, you have to learn how to deal with that.”

“Try looking at them like you’re unimpressed.” Agent Brown flashed a grin at Agent Martinez. “It’s worked for some people.”

“So, just so everyone is on the same page: unless there’s a very good reason, all transfer requests will be denied until things settle.” Laura held eye contact with each of them until they nodded. “Remember everyone applied to be where they are, and both Agent Hill and myself agreed on placements. I don’t want to see another transfer request for at least two more months.”

The meeting smoothed out after that as each of them in turn gave their list of complaints to Laura and she figured out the best ways to deal with them. Some of the complaints were easily solved. The easiest was the lack of training space for exceptionalities, all that was required was that they use some of the training funds to build a decent training facility. The complaints about living spaces was solved in much the same way. Laura pointed out that if any Agents didn’t want to find their own places there were always a dozen empty S.H.I.E.L.D. dorms that they were welcome to apply for, like any other Agents. Others Laura had to make note of and work on at a later date, like the rather bizarre classification system for new files which she was still trying to sort out. Those she added to her ever growing list of headaches before sending her department heads back to their own offices.

After everyone had cleared out, she sighed and dumped the whole pile of transfer requests into the shredder. That was one headache gone at least. Most of them would (hopefully) settle once the aftershocks of the division move had worn off. She had a dozen things to do before she got to escape back to her apartment though so she dropped into her chair to get started.

 

—

 

Clint was supposed to be out on mission for another two days when Laura got home to find him on their couch staring at the wall like he was seeing something else. As she closed the door Natasha came over with a mug of hot chocolate. She gestured towards the mug on the coffee table. “He got home twenty minutes ago, I made hot chocolate but he hasn’t touched it. He won't speak to me.”

Laura nodded and Natasha headed off to her own room. Laura sat down beside Clint. “Clint? Love what happened?”

“The mission, it…” he trailed off shaking his head. She took his hands and gently unclenched his fists while he tried to find words. “There were, Laur, there were kids…”

“Kids where?” Laura squeezed his hands gently and he turned to look at her. His eyes still looked far away, like he was just barely holding it together.

“The target, the guy I was sent to take out, he took kids hostage.” Clint closed his eyes.  He took a deep breath before continuing, his eyes still closed. “The oldest of them was only fifteen, I didn't ask how old the youngest was, why didn't I ask how old the youngest was?”

He opened his eyes as he asked, searching her face like he might find his answer there. Laura just shook her head. “It's okay, you were a bit busy to ask questions like that. What happened?”

“He took a bus. Who does that? What kind of- he took a bus full of kids.” Clint cut himself off. He had an expression like his skin felt pulled to tight and Laura found herself brushing her thumbs over his knuckles automatically. “He took the bus and the kids and drove into a warehouse and locked them in. Threatened to kill the kids if anyone came after him.”

Laura took a breath to stop her voice from shaking, being upset wasn't going to help. “There was no guarantee he wouldn’t anyway.”

“That’s why I went after him.” Clint nodded. “He had to be stopped and backup would just alert him that I was coming. The kids were terrified when I got there and there was a fight…”

He trailed off and Laura squeezed his fingers waiting to see if he’d pick it up on his own.

“He’d planted a bomb Laura.” He squeezed her hands staring at her like he was still seeing it. “He planted a bomb behind the kids just out of my line of sight, he triggered it as he died.”

“Did they?” Laura almost didn’t want to ask it but she needed to know, plus she had a feeling he needed to say it out loud.

He shook his head just slightly. “The youngest of them was couldn’t have been older than ten Laur’, just a baby. The biggest one took most of the blast. The kids knew where the bomb was Laur’ they’d watched him set it up.”

“Thats…” She trailed off, couldn’t think of any words to describe what it was exactly but Clint was nodding anyway.

“The kid that took most of the blast did it to save the little one, wrapped themself around her.” Clint stared at their hands. “Died on top of her, saved her life. When I left two of them had broken limbs for sure, and I didn’t see how the other two were- alive but, I don’t know. Only the little one had barely a scratch on her. I left when I heard sirens, S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn’t supposed to be there after all. I was supposed to be invisible, unnoticeable…”

“Drink this.” Laura picked up the hot chocolate and pushed it into his hands. Then she stood up and headed for the kitchen. “I’m going to make stew.”

“It’s my-”

“It’s not your fault.” She cut him off, she knew the look she’d seen in his eyes. She’d seen it often enough in the mirror. “You did you job, that’s all anyone can ask of you.”

“You don’t have to say-”

“I’m not saying it as your friend Clint.” Laura cut him off as she chopped up the veggies and started the meat cooking. “Even as your superior officer, you did all you could have.”

When she turned to get the carrot peeler he was already there, holding it out and frowning. “You’re not- you’re, we’re…”

She took the peeler from him and put it down on the cutting board while she waited for him to find words.

“Friends isn’t…” He ran a hand through his hair before catching her hand. “Marry me?”

“Because friends isn’t the right word?” Laura raised an eyebrow.

“Because you’re always here for me and I love you and our demons get along.” His eyes started to get watery and Laura couldn’t tell if it was laughter or tears in his voice. “And because when I first left the circus for you, Azure told me if I didn’t invite them to our wedding they were going to have to come kick my ass.”

“Well we can’t disappoint Azure now can we?” Laura chuckled as she realized her eyes had started to water too.

“I’m supposed to have a ring aren’t I?” Clint was properly laughing now and he leaned forward to kiss her. 

“Oh, S.H.I.E.L.D. is going to love that.” They both turned to see Natasha leaning on the door frame of her room. “They’ve already got themselves in a twist over you two being together.”

“S.H.I.E.L.D. can deal.” Laura shook her head and turned to start peeling the carrots.

Natasha rolled her eyes and came over to help cook.

 

—

 

Laura leaned over her paperwork with a frown, if she had to read one more request for something she’d already said wasn’t available she was going to scream. When the door opened she shoved the stack aside with a feeling akin to relief and looked up. The relief faded when she saw Max standing in the doorway.

“I brought you chocolates!” Max held out a box; Laura wondered who exactly she’d nicked them from as she wasn’t allowed to leave the base and didn’t have access to funds.

“Well if you brought chocolate.” Laura chuckled and gestured to the seat that was facing her desk.

Rather than sitting, Max put the box on the desk and stood next to the chair looking like she was fighting the urge to pace. “See, I was just wondering, well you know I’m enhanced right? So technically I fall under your part of S.H.I.E.L.D. even though they keep trying to stick me elsewhere. The thing is see I want something to do. There’ve got to be positions available. Real ones, ones where I can make a difference!”

“I suppose you asked Hill already?” She just barely stopped herself from trying to rub away the headache she could feel coming on. Max wasn’t supposed to have access to that information either.

“She says no but she also tried to convince me I was at a boarding school when I first got here.” Max kicked and the ground before dropping, finally, into the chair. “I just want to do something.”

Laura bit the inside of her cheek to stop from laughing, Hill had clearly never dealt with a teenager before Max. Not that Laura herself had experience exactly, just more recent memories of being a teen. The main problem with making Max an Agent rather than a ward would be finding a handler who could actually handle her. “I’ll see if I can find anything, for now go back to your rooms and stop tormenting the guards, they’re just trying to do their job.”

“How did you..?”

“You’re a teenager.” Laura shrugged with one shoulder as she looked back at her pile of paperwork.

“Fiiiiine.” Max grumbled as she stood up. “You promise you’ll actually look though?”

“Yes Max.” Laura looked up again so she could make eye contact with her as she spoke. “I promise to actually try and find something for you.”

“Okay.” She nodded and headed back towards the door leaving Laura to her paperwork with the obviously nicked chocolates on her desk.

The mystery of where Max had nicked the chocolates from was answered as soon as Laura actually looked at the box, a small label marked them as a gift for Coulson. Laura shrugged and opened them anyway, scribbling a note to herself so she’d remember to get him something as a replacement. Next to it she also made a note to take Agent Hill out for drinks sometime and explain to her why exactly trying to pass off a S.H.I.E.L.D. base as a boarding school was a terrible idea.

 

—

 

Laura had thought trying to plan their wedding around the circus’ schedule would prove difficult, but to her surprise they shut down the circus for two entire weeks just so they were all able to come. As soon as they realized she’d barely put any planning into the wedding however, the whole lot of them made disapproving noises and went into hard core planning mode. By the time she woke up on the morning of her wedding, the whole thing had been re-planned.  E & A had designed and sewn entirely new outfits for her, Clint, Natasha, and as far as Laura could tell the entire rest of the circus.

Having lost the rock, paper, scissors match, Dakota and River had become Clint’s best men while Olive and Azure got to be Laura’s bridesmaids.

“Come on let’s get you into this dress E & A made!” Azure swept into the room like they had their own soundtrack playing and Olive followed with a grin on her face. The two of them were already wearing their dresses. Olive’s was light blue and Azure was wearing mint but the style was the same on both of them, simple and flowing to just above their ankles.

Olive was the one who pulled Laura’s dress down from its rack and shook it out, causing layers and layers of colourful floaty fabric to shiver. The dress was beautiful, a thousand shades of purple with pink and gold highlights, not dissimilar from the costume E & A had made her years ago. As she put it on she realized that, like the costume from years ago, this one was also made entirely out of fabric she could actually move in. Plus it had dozens of little pockets hidden in it. She let out a laugh and twirled to show it off, a dress designed for her to be able to fight in.

“They outdo themselves every time they make a new outfit.” Olive nodded appreciatively before gesturing for Laura to sit in a chair near which they’d set up a huge assortment of makeup and hair product.

Azure and Olive tossed words and jokes back and forth as they helped with her hair and did her makeup. By the time they let her leave the room she felt like she had a cloud of hairspray and makeup surrounding her head. Even that couldn’t stop the giddiness that bubbled within her. Her feelings rolled around in her chest so quickly she couldn’t pin down what they were exactly, apart from good, but she had a sneaking suspicion this might be what proper family felt like.

Natasha joined them as they left the apartment building and climbed into a limo that one of their circus family had rented for the occasion. The outfit she wore was clearly another E & A original. The fabric was black with a handful of artfully located red highlights and it fit her so closely it gave the appearance of hiding nothing, but Laura had enough experience with their design to know Natasha could probably store half an armory under the dress.

The inside of the church had been decorated in white lace and lilacs and Laura had to admit it did look much better like this than it would have looked undecorated. Natasha, Olive, and Azure walked in first and when Laura came in the crowd started cheering and she started laughing. Near the front she could see E & A nodding approvingly and Clary was waving her top hat around.

Laura was still laughing when she looked straight ahead and saw Clint. His suit was shade of purple so deep it would have looked black if it wasn’t for the pale pink shirt he wore underneath. His whole face went soft as their eyes met and suddenly it was all she could do not to run down the aisle directly into his arms. Beside him Dakota and River were wearing tuxes that matched with Olive and Azure’s dresses in the same way Clint’s matched hers.

The ceremony was quick and simple with Clary standing up to officiate the wedding, as she’d removed everything she didn’t think was necessary from the speech portions. As soon as they’d both said ‘I do’ Clint picked her up and spun her around and she was laughing as they kissed. Laura leaned against him and remembered lying on the roof of an R.V. and trying not to think about how well they fit together.

The party everyone was trying to usher them off to would no doubt last all night, but this right here, was the part she wanted to remember forever; her family around her cheering as she and Clint held each other.

 

—

 

Laura did a lap around the block before she walked into the bar, more out of habit than any actual worry as it was the on base, it was a S.H.I.E.L.D. bar after all. Once inside it was easy to find where Agent Hill was sitting. Somehow it didn’t surprise Laura at all that Agent Hill sat on the seat at bar that gave her the clearest view of the entire place despite the fact that this was supposed to be on of the safest locations in the world.

“I’m glad you came.” Laura grinned as she took the seat next to Agent Hill. “I feel like you could probably do with letting off some steam.”

“By all accounts, you don’t have the same problem.” The tone in Agent Hill’s voice was almost annoyed but there was a small smile on her face that told a different story.

“You talking about Max, the numerous complaints from my department, or Clint?” Laura raised an eyebrow as the bartender brought her a drink without her having to order. The guy had a distressingly good memory.

“I don’t put stock in complaints unless they’re about something important.” She waved a hand but narrowed her eyes slightly as she processed what Laura had said. “What about Max?”

“Ah, so she did stop bothering you then. Fantastic.” Laura grinned, she’d been almost certain Max would keep pestering Agent Hill about positions. “I’ve been trying to find her a handler so I can give her something to do, so far none of them click. Not even in training simulations.”

“You’re giving her a position?” Agent Hill’s fingers tapped against the edge of her glass for a moment. “Are you sure that’s wise?”

“Are you worried about her age or her background?”

“Both, and her general dislike of authorities and inability to get along with people.”

“Ward’s worse than her and we managed to find a place for him.” Laura pointed out with a shrug. “She’s enhanced and she’ll be useful once I find someone who can deal with her.”

As she pointed it out Agent Hill was already nodding. “I suppose, it’s your department after all.”

“Speaking of Max,” Laura sipped her drink and let a smile creep onto her face. “did you really try to convince her that this S.H.I.E.L.D. base was a boarding school?”

Agent Hill groaned and rubbed at her forehead. “She told you I gather? It would have worked fine if it wasn’t for the fact that she kept sneaking out of the campus portion of the base. She was just supposed to mingle with the other students.”

“You mean the students who are constantly talking about S.H.I.E.L.D.?” She raised an eyebrow and from the look on Agent Hill’s face that hadn’t occurred to her before.

“Fine, yes, it was a terrible plan.” As she was speaking Laura heard footsteps and turned to see Agent Coulson coming over to them.

“Mind if I join you too?” He grinned and gestured to a chair behind Hill. “I don’t feel much like drinking alone.”

Laura looked at Agent Hill who just shrugged so she did too. “Sure.”

“Hey, as long as you’re here, what’re your thoughts on Max?” Laura asked as he sat down. She’d assigned Coulson to watch today while a dozen different handlers tried to run Max through the simulation. “Off the record, I’ll read your proper reports tomorrow.”

“She clashes with her handlers on principle more than anything else and most of them react poorly enough that she immediately stops listening to them.” He shrugged and waved the bartender over so he could order. “She needs a handler she trusts, or at the very least one who isn’t going to get offended when she tests them.”

“We’ll figure something out tomorrow.” Laura nodded.

“Speaking of Max thanks for replacing the chocolates, the ones you bought me were much nicer than the ones she swiped.” He grinned at her as he sipped his drink.

Then the conversation moved to other topics, Agents or paperwork or something of the sort. Laura wasn’t sure who suggested the shots in the first place but by the seventh or eighth round the three of them were quite far past tipsy.

“Me and Fury were watching your test you know, he insisted on it.” Hill leaned towards Laura with an almost conspirative tone or it would have been if she wasn’t quite so loud. “You were a favourite of his from the moment you insisted that if he was hiring Clint he was hiring you too.”

“Not yours then I take it?” Laura leaned back against the bar as she asked it.

“Oh no I didn't like you at all.” Hill shook her head as Coulson sat behind her watching. “I thought ‘who does this kid think she is, making Fury step back and look like a fool’ but then you were so good, and at everything he wanted you to do? And you worked so hard? It was like you were made for this life.”

Laura smiled so Hill wouldn't see the flinch the last sentence caused and twisted around to take her last shot before speaking. “Well I've always been ‘a pleasure to have in class.’”

“A good boss too.” Coulson nodded vigorously and Laura found that a small part of her wanted to protect this boy, the one who rambled about captain America to anyone who would listen and had a grin like sunshine. For a moment she felt as though he were a child and not a fully fledged Agent.

 

—

 

Not two weeks after drinks with Hill and Coulson, a file landed on Laura’s desk containing a mission entirely too dangerous for the one person it called for. It was both long term and largely undercover, so Laura did the only thing she could and sent her best Agent, Clint.

After he’d gone she felt exhausted and nauseous for nearly a week before she even thought to test for anything other than a flu bug. Then she spent the hours leading up to Clint’s morning check in debating whether she should tell him over the phone or wait until he got back. Then the hour during which he normally called passed and Laura caught herself frowning at the phone over her pile of paperwork every few minutes. It wasn’t long after however that her office started to resemble a revolving door. People shot in and out with problems, files, people, and more problems, any and all of which just made her pile of paperwork grow. When she glanced up and noticed that Clint’s evening check in hour had come and gone as well however she felt a spike of adrenaline lance through her system.

She’d worked herself up into a proper panic by the time she got home, only to find the apartment empty and most of Natasha’s clothes gone. On Natasha’s desk was what looked like an old morse code radio spliced together out of a car radio with a print out added. Laura pulled the print off off of the machine and glanced at it long enough to make out an S.O.S and what looked like it might be a location but she didn’t recognize the code it was written in. The anxiety that rippled through her felt like a bucket of ice.

Minutes later, she was out of the apartment and on her way back to S.H.I.E.L.D. As she moved she was already calling Coulson back in. When she arrived at the base he was at her side almost immediately, clearly having turned around before even really leaving the base.

“Clint’s missed his check ins with you too?” Coulson blinked at her and for a moment looked much younger than he really was. Wondering if she could learn to master that trick distracted her from the anxiety for just long enough that she could make herself nod.

After that he stayed quiet as she moved through the halls and went straight into Agent Fury’s office. As they entered she saw Hill standing beside the desk and somehow it didn’t surprise her at all that she was already in the office.

“What wasn’t in that mission file?” Laura demanded as she walked straight up to Agent Fury’s desk. He just looked at her with his eyebrows raised and anger flared up, easily overriding the anxiety. “Clint’s missed two check ins, but he managed to send Natasha some kind of coded S.O.S. that I can’t decipher. Now she’s gone too, so you’re going to want to start speaking.”

“Am I?” His eyebrows rose fractionally higher. “Why’s that?”

“Because otherwise you’re going to find out what exactly it is about me that made you step back in the first place.” Laura snarled. Then she felt a hand on her arm and turned to see Hill standing far closer to her than she had been a second ago.

“Who’s Natasha?” She had a frown on her face like she might already know and disapprove of the answer to her question but Laura was to worried about her family and angry with S.H.I.E.L.D. to care all that much about Hill’s disapproval.

“She’d be the last reason Clint missed a check in.” Behind her she could hear Coulson’s sharp intake of breath but her eyes were on Hill as she spoke so she saw the hurt flash across her face before it was shoved behind anger. Agent Fury’s expression however hadn’t changed as she turned to look at him.

“Why exactly did you decided to keep the information that she was alive from us?” Agent Fury’s expression might not have changed but his voice sounded like ice.

“Didn’t you think we’d help?” Hill spoke a beat after Agent Fury stopped.

“Help? I absolutely did not think you’d help. You were the ones who sent my boy to kill Natasha in the first place! Even though you knew she looked no older than fourteen!” Laura snapped the words out looking between the two of them, a memory of looking up at the stars as Clint laughed about not being taught be couldn’t be both suddenly bubbling to the surface. She took a breath before continuing. “Of course we hid her from you, you ordered her dead in the first place.”

“So Natalia survived our Agent after all.” Agent Fury looked almost thoughtful now.

“So the asset has gone after-”

“Her name is Natasha.” Laura cut Hill off with another glare at the both of them. “She picked the name and you will use it.”

“Natasha-“ Hill nodded at Laura and took the order in stride. “-has gone after Clint. Can we trust her to bring him back to S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

“She’ll bring him home.” Laura said it in a tone that dared either of them to argue with her.

“I don’t know how much it matters but I happen to agree with Laura.” Coulson’s voice was quiet but all three of them turned to look at where he was standing just inside the doorway. When they all stared at him instead of speaking he shrugged and continued. “She’s been living with Laura and Agent Barton for quite a while now, if she wanted either of them dead they would be by now. There’s also the fact that with the chance to send a message to anyone, Agent Barton chose her. She even had the set up to receive his message, and in a code the two of them no doubt set up together.”

“He’s right, it’s not any code a government uses or I’d have recognized it.” Laura nodded calming down fractionally as he spoke.

“So, we wait then.” Hill said and Laura nodded again, it was the only option really.

“Now that that’s settled Agent Coulson, Agent Smith you may both return to your posts.” Fury’s voice still had a layer of ice in it but Laura just made a mental note to send him a fruit basket or something as she left.

She went to her office, gathered any files that could be done away from her desk, and headed for the hanger. She didn’t even notice that Coulson was still following her until she’d tucked herself into a corner where she could see everything and there was suddenly a shadow across her. In the back of her mind she could hear criticisms about focus and worth but she ignored them and simply frowned up at Coulson.

“I’ll have someone bring you a desk, and coffee.” He nodded after a half a second pause and walked away before she could respond. Laura frowned at his retreating back in confusion for a full minute before she opened the first file.

The rest of the night Laura spent in a tense caffeinated state staring at files more than actually reading them. Every hour or so Coulson would stop by the desk he’d set up for her and shift things around, replacing her beverages, taking files, or leaving more. Sometime in the early hours of the morning he left food for her and she ate it without actually tasting it. Against her will Laura drifted off sometime around sunrise and was woken several hours later by the sound of a non-S.H.I.E.L.D. issue jet followed by a familiar voice loudly cursing someone out in Russian for getting themselves hurt.

Laura was out of her seat and most of the way to the voice before she was even properly awake. She blinked several times to make sure she wasn’t dreaming the site of Clint limping off the jet followed by Natasha. Someone who didn’t know Natasha might have thought she was simply annoyed, but Laura could see the lines of worry in her face. As soon as she’d convinced herself it wasn’t a dream, Laura ran towards them and nearly knocked Clint over as she grabbed him.

“You’re an idiot! You’re both idiots! You’re supposed to call when you’re in trouble! How badly are you hurt?” Laura hardly noticed how loud her voice was getting as she tried to both hug Clint close and pat him down to locate injuries. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Natasha take half a step away and she reached out to catch her arm before she could get to far away for Laura to pull close. “You’re not off the hook either! Running off like that and giving me a heart attack! Leave a note next time!”

“I’m okay love, really, Nat got me out.” Clint had wrapped an arm around her and pressed close regardless.

“I uh…” Nat started and trailed off as Laura pulled her close. She patted Laura’s back like she wasn’t sure what exactly she was supposed to do in this situation.

The clattering of something metallic hitting the hangar floor made Laura pull back just enough to turn around. Standing behind them was Coulson looking extremely relieved. “Oh, thank god.”

“I thought you trusted that she’d bring him home.” Laura tried for a grin but by the feel of it she was missing by a long shot.

“I was just worried I’d have to drug you again if she took to much longer.” He lifted one shoulder as she frowned. “Just a sleeping pill, you weren’t going to sleep if left to your own devices.”

“Let’s go home?” Natasha asked quietly, stepping properly close to Laura once she saw how many S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents had gathered in response to the noise they were making.

“I’ll send our reports to you tomorrow.” Laura raised an eyebrow at Coulson until he nodded. As she lead Clint and Natasha out of the hanger she squeezed Coulson’s arm in a silent thank you.

Laura didn’t let go of either Clint or Natasha for more than a few seconds until they were back in their apartment building. As she opened the door to the apartment she stopped so suddenly both of them ran into her back. “Shit, I’m pregnant.”


	10. The art of dying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laura has always been rather good at making and sticking to her plans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Never ending thanks to Lindy (rooish on tumblr) for being a lovely editor and my best cheerleader, thanks also to anyone who's reading this fic! You're all lovely!

Once the idea of being pregnant had settled properly into her mind, it was easy for Laura to figure out what she wanted to do. While S.H.I.E.L.D. was busy getting Nat on file as Clint’s partner, Laura busied herself creating a new identity. The property out in the middle of somewhere almost no one cared about-- except a small farming community-- was easy to acquire cheaply and under the name Laura Barton. Then she set about transferring her saved up money to her new identity in as untraceable a way as possible.

When Clint got called into S.H.I.E.L.D. to fill out reports Laura made tea for herself and Nat.

“You only make that kind of tea when you have something on your mind.” Natasha tapped her fingers on the counter as she watched Laura.

“Well uh…” Laura started and then frowned at the box. “Do I?”

“Normally you complain that it doesn’t taste quite right, but you still make it when you’re not paying attention.”

“Huh. Well I do have something to talk about.” Laura pushed a cup towards Natasha and went to sit at the table. Natasha nodded to show she was listening as she followed her to the table.   “I want my kids to grow up safe and happy and far away from all of this. Away from S.H.I.E.L.D.”

Natasha examined her for a few minutes before nodding. “Out of danger.”

“Exactly.” Laura nodded and stared down at her tea. “With my background they’ll never be safe if I’m on S.H.I.E.L.D. files.”

“You’re already on the files.” Natasha narrowed her eyes slightly, trying to piece it together.

“Right, but if I’m on the files as dead that will stop most people from looking for me.” She held up a hand to stop Natasha from interrupting. “I have a safe house, a home. I’m going to go into the field and not come back, they’ll mark me as dead, and I can go to my safe house.”

She thought it over for a moment and then frowned. “Clint won't be able to hide it if he knows already.”

“I’m glad you agree. He’s good at acting deaf and foolish but he’s no good at pretending at an emotion he doesn’t feel.” Laura nodded and handed her an envelope. “I want you to give Clint this after they tell him and he reacts. It’s an explanation and an address so the two of you can find me after.”

Natasha tucked the envelope into a pocket and sipped her tea. Laura squeezed her shoulder as she walked past, she still had to pack for the field mission she was going to go on.

 

—

 

Two days later she found herself standing in director Fury’s office staring him down as he looked between her and his computer. “You’ve assigned yourself to this mission.”

“Yes.” Laura nodded as she heard the door behind her open and close.

“Why?”

“It’s a vital piece of intel located in an area known to be extremely dangerous if I’m only sending one agent in it should be myself.” She kept her voice even and her face blank; it was only half a lie anyway, all the best lies are.

“That’s the kind of thinking that lost me my eye.” Director Fury frowned at her.

“You have the least field experience of any of the agents in your branch.” Hill’s voice came from behind her and Laura just shrugged.

There was a few minutes of silence as director Fury waited for her to argue the points but when she didn’t he shrugged as well. “Fine, if you die that’s entirely on you.”

“Sir!” Hill’s voice sounded almost worried and Laura almost wanted to reassure her that she wasn’t actually going to die.  That, however, was out of the question. She simply grinned at Hill as she walked out of director Fury’s office. The sounds of Hill vehemently arguing with director Fury were audible until Laura was several hallways away.

Laura headed straight for the hanger and the S.H.I.E.L.D. jet that would drop her in the middle of a danger zone. She’d already told Clint she was going into the field and she doubted she could talk to him again without telling him her whole plan. 

 The ride in the jet was quiet, Coulson sat across from her as she read and reread the file. He was there because a handler was required, and he was the best she had. When they came close to the area where she would have to drop Coulson touched her knee and she handed him the file.

Two minutes before the drop Coulson finally spoke to her. “Fury thinks you’re doing this mission yourself because you’re soft, scared maybe.”

“I don’t doubt that.” Laura nodded, it fit with the very few reasons she’d let director Fury see for why she did things.

“Hill thinks you have a death wish.” Based on the tone he used Laura guessed Coulson thought Hill was closer to the truth. He was right of course. “I think it’s because you’re being sentimental.”

“The three aren’t mutually exclusive.” Laura shrugged and stepped backwards onto thin air. Halfway down Laura decided that falling from a jet to find a target location was one of the better ways to get into a dangerous area. Granted as it was against walking or hoping she got a motorbike, the bar wasn’t all that high. She released the parachute low enough that it wouldn’t be detected, and left the whole opened mess of it stashed under a tree root near where she’d landed.

The mission itself was easy enough, get into the building, copy some files, and drop the copy at the pre-approved pick up location. The part that made this mission dangerous was the lack of contact with handlers and that there was no extraction plan. The idea was you’d get yourself to the nearest S.H.I.E.L.D. base or safe house and make contact to arrange an extraction. Rather than head for the nearest S.H.I.E.L.D. building however Laura headed towards a mostly abandoned area full of warehouses.

It took almost no effort to get the local branch of ‘we’re not nazis but-’ on her tail. All it took was a few well placed words and one fist fight. They had enough ties to Hydra it wouldn’t really matter whether they were part of it or not, not for what she needed them for anyway. One of the women in the group chasing Laura was nearly exactly the same build and weight as her. Though unintentional it was an added bonus as it would save her a trip to the morgue.

The warehouse they tracked her to was well away from the general public and conveniently filled with explosive materials. It was also where she’d hidden her S.H.I.E.L.D. issue ID and travel luggage well enough that the police investigation would miss them but not well enough that S.H.I.E.L.D.’s investigation would.

The explosion she set off  once they thought they had her cornered inside was so massive it made every news network in the area that day and all the newspapers the next. They reported the massive explosion, the dozen or so dead bodies, or limbs that pieced together into something like a doze. The fact that one of them that was a female that had it’s teeth knocked out and was made virtually unidentifiable was added to official reports and barely tacked onto the media reports. It was enough that S.H.I.E.L.D. would be able put two and two together.

Laura got on the next flight back to the States with a false passport and the name Jane Brown. Jane Brown disappeared after entering the States, coincidentally. Laura bought a truck with the name Laura Barton. It really was the perfect vehicle for her small town girl identity that had legally married Clint. Then she drove to the property she bought years ago with the same identity and tried not to think about how Clint was going to react when he got the news either from Hill, Coulson, or the media.

She stopped at what was now her local grocery store and joked with the teller about how small town kids always end up back in a small town one way or another. When she got to the property she let out a sigh. It was huge and full of patchy half growth in fields that had clearly at one time been used for proper farming. There was a winding gravel road through to the center of her property which shifted eventually into the circle of gravel that was her driveway.

A barn stood solid and red to one side of the driveway and up on the top of a sloping green area stood a squat farmhouse. The paint was peeling and the front porch looked like it was about to crumble away but it was wide and Laura could see the good bones underneath as she walked up the green.

 

—

 

Less than a day after Laura arrived another old truck pulled up behind hers. From her perch on the porch she could see Clint jolt awake in the passenger seat as Natasha put it in park. He practically threw himself through the door and towards Laura once she caught his eye. She barely had time to brace herself before he thudded into her, wrapping his arms around her waist and burying his face in her neck.

“Don't you ever die on me again, that was the worst half hour of my life.” He mumbled the words into her neck.

“I shouldn't need to, seeing as I'm already dead.” Laura tucked herself around him regardless and it felt like coming home.

Natasha came over to them and squeezed Laura’s shoulder. “I agree with Clint.”

“This house though, really?” Clint had pulled back just enough to see the place and he was frowning. “It’s falling down around your ears.”

“It was cheap and it has good bones, I could see that from just the photos.” Laura turned to face the doorway leaving one arm looped around Clint’s waist. “We can fix it up.”

“We could also tear it down and start from scratch.” Clint pointed out frowning at a patch of paint that was peeling away from the wall in a large gently curling strip.

“It’ll be much more fun this way though.” Laura grinned and walked backwards down the steps and gesturing up at the house as she spoke. “Imagine it with better paint, a newer working kitchen, and a proper porch. Maybe a second floor?”

“Working kitchen?” Natasha asked her eyebrows creeping upwards.

“Does that mean the current kitchen doesn’t work?” Clint frowned at her.

“It works, just not well.” Laura twitched one shoulder up. “The wiring is all wrong and the stove takes a good kick to get started.”

“Half of these walls are broken.” Natasha pointed out when Clint seemed unable to form words.

“The structure is sound though.” She rubbed at the back of her neck as Natasha stared her down. “It just needs new everything…”

“I’m married to a madwoman.” Clint muttered rubbing at his forehead with the hand that wasn’t around Laura’s waist.

“A dead madwoman.” Laura grinned and turned so they were facing the fields. “Look at all this space though, we could grow food, keep some animals maybe. Imagine the kids running and playing in all this space.”

“Kids…” Clint trailed off staring at the green space and the fields that wrapped around it all.

“Well, if I’m going to have the one anyway.” Laura chuckled and leaned her head on Clint’s shoulder. “Not too close together though.”

“How are we going to…” Clint trailed off again and this time Laura knew why immediately, none of them had any real experience with kids, or even with decent parents.

“We’ll figure it out.” She said it with a conviction she wasn’t sure she felt. Then she grinned at where Natasha was standing a step or two away from her. “And I’m sure the kids’ll love their Aunt Nat too.”

“I’m not-” Natasha frowned again and looked out towards the field. “I don’t know anything about children.”

“Then you’ll fit right in.” Laura smiled at her. She could see the whole thing in her mind as she looked out at the fields; fences with knife marks in them, Russian lullabies, and movie nights curled up on a too small couch with to many people. Now she just had to figure out how to make it all happen.

 

—

 

“Right so we’re telling our circus folk the truth then? The ones we can trust?” Laura looked between the two of them. Two days had passed and they were no closer to a decision on how exactly to fix up the house, so Laura had come up with a distraction of sorts. A list of people they’d let in on the secret that she was still alive and how much they’d tell each of them. So far the only ones they’d all agreed on telling were the circus folk.

“Yes.” Natasha said as Clint nodded beside her.

“Perfect.” Laura pulled out her phone, a new one she’d set up with this identity as she’d left her old one in the warehouse that she’d ‘died’ in. Clary picked up on the first ring and Laura felt herself grinning as soon as she heard her voice. “Hey it’s Laura, I just wanted to call and let you guys know that technically I’m dead now.”

“You’re what now?” From the echoey sound of Clary’s voice Laura would bet they were driving.

“Dead, but only technically.” Laura repeated her fingers tapping a pattern out on her knee. “I faked my death for a variety of reasons and now I’m in my own version of protective services.”

“Huh, you’ll do better that way than with the regular kind anyway.” Clary said after a moment and Laura found she wasn’t really surprised that Clary didn’t seem at all confused by the whole ‘I faked my death’ thing.

“I thought so.” Laura agreed. “I can send you my address if you’d like, it needs some fixing up still but I like it.”

“You’re sold on its good bones huh?” Clary sounded like she was laughing and Laura found it entirely too easy to laugh along.

“Well yeah, good bones have always been the best selling point for me.”

“Well that explains plenty.” There was a clatter followed by shouting in the background of Clary’s call. “These new hires are never as good as you two were, I’ve got to go put out some fires child I’ll talk to you and Clint later.”

Before Laura had a chance to reply the line went dead and Laura snorted.

“She took that rather well.” Natasha frowned at Laura’s phone as Clint chuckled. “Did she mean real fires?”

“Oh probably, if you shoot some of those trick arrows wrong they’ll light up a whole tent. Though it sounded like they were driving so potentially someone’s in a ditch.” Laura shrugged and Clint nodded miming an explosion complete with whistled sound effects. Then she stood up and looked around the empty still falling down house. “Alright, we should get started on fixing up this place if that lot are going to suddenly drop by. Or at least get some furniture.”

“Nu-uh.” Clint pointed back at the spot she’d been sitting in. “You sit, we can fix this.”

“I’m pregnant not broken.” Laura rolled her eyes. “Besides if you’re that fussed I should be sitting out on one of the trucks not in here while you work.”

“Yes, good idea.” He made a shooing motion. “Out you go.”

“Fine, whatever you say love.” Laura leaned in to kiss his cheek before walking out of the house and climbing into the back of her truck. Then she pulled out her phone and started bouncing around online. It only took a few minutes to locate all the places in town she’d need to go to finished her ‘who gets to know I’m not dead’ list. Once she’d decided she moved from the back of her truck and started it up. She didn’t bother calling into the house, didn’t need to, Clint glanced up when Natasha noticed the noise of the engines. Laura placed one hand flat and moved the other over it with her knuckles down and her thumb pressed against her fingers. When he nodded she pulled out of the drive and headed into town.

First place she stopped was a gas station where she picked up a postcard with a field on it that could be from anywhere. Once she’d checked that it had no location listed she payed for it and tucked it into her pocket. Next stop was the fanciest store in town, which is to say basically Walmart but with a local owner. She picked some chocolates, some brand with a fancy box that was probably decent tasting and could be from any department store in north America.

Then she went to a payphone to call a company that was based in New York and arranged for a fruit basket to be delivered to S.H.I.E.L.D. for Hill with a note attached that said ‘You have ridiculous eating habits, who doesn’t eat chocolate? That’s absurd.’ The postcard she tossed dozens of stamps from about twenty different countries onto and mailed to Fury’s home address with no message or return address, he’d either understand or he wouldn’t that was up to him. The chocolates she posted with ten stamps, each from a different country, no return address, and a note that said ‘you were all wrong really’ and hoped that Coulson would understand.

 

—

 

Only a couple days after Laura called Clary she heard the unmistakable sound of RVs pulling up along the dirt road followed by Clary’s booming voice. “Good bones is about all this place has going for it Laura. It hardly even has walls!”

“But the bones of it are enough, we can build something wonderful here.” Laura grinned at Clary as she came outside and swung down off the balcony. Two more RVs pulled up behind Clary’s and Azure, Olive, Dakota, and River climbed out of them to frown at the house. “You didn’t have to come all the way here.”

“And what?” Azure stepped forward to sling their arm around Laura’s shoulders.

“Let Clint take all the credit for fixing up your house?” Olive tucked her arm around Laura’s waist.

“We can’t have that.” Azure grinned as Dakota and River walked over to them.

“And you’re hardly off our regular route at all, I let our next stop know we’ll be a day late. Might add this town in next year if someone else has a large enough field to house us closer to the town proper.” Clary waved a hand. “These four want to stay and help you two get settled. They’ll meet up again once they’ve finished.”

“Well, we need all the help we can get.” Clint came out of the house as Clary was speaking. “This place is barely functional as a shack, let alone a house for Laura to live in alone and pregnant while I’m in another state.”

“Then you definitely need our help.” Dakota grinned and Laura didn’t bother fighting the impulse to roll her eyes.

“Can’t have a pregnant Laura working no, no, no.” River wagged their finger in Laura’s direction.

“You can sit and tell us what we’re doing wrong instead.” Azure said cheerfully and ruffled her hair. Then they removed their arm from her shoulder and headed off to wander the property with Dakota and River.

“Or right.” Olive laughed.

“The scary red head from the wedding is here!” River called out from inside the house and Laura sighed as she leaned into the hold Olive still had on her waist.

Clary laughed at the lot of them and headed back towards her RV. “I’ve done my part, I have to go catch up to Cook and the others. You lot behave.”

“Yes mother!” Clint joined the other four as they responded to her, Laura just waved.

“You can call me Natasha.” Her voice carried as Laura and Olive turned to follow Clint and the others into the house. She came in to see Natasha perched on one of the counters, Clint leaning beside her and the other three grouped in front of them. They all turned to look at her as she walked in, all of them with their smiles of various warmths, and she felt that tug inside of her, the one that felt something like family.

The next few weeks were a constant state of movement around the house. First the four circus folk setup the RV’s and the surrounding field like they would at any other stop. A fire pit was dug in the green field with chairs around it pulled from the RVs, a bed was set up in Dakota and River’s RV for Laura to sleep in. Clint had waved off an offer for his own as he was happy to sleep in the grass and Natasha had claimed a place in the barn for sleeping and when being around people were just too much.

Then the renovations started. The walls, wiring, kitchen, flooring, and porch were removed to leave just the bones of the place before they did anything else at all. They spent nearly a week checking the foundations of the place and strengthening weak spots. More supports went up, and those that needed it were replaced. After which Laura showed them her plans, pulled sketches out of her truck and talked with her hands until they were all grinning and nodding.

Then Laura watched from her place beside the fire as all her plans come to life. The walls went up, a new kitchen went in, a staircase was built, and the beginnings of a second floor were put up. They called in professionals from time to time, for wiring or plumbing, but for the most part it was just the five or six of them working while Laura supervised.

Throughout the first several weeks Natasha stayed around the fringes a small frown on her face, occasionally she left for days at a time to check in with S.H.I.E.L.D., make Clint’s excuses for him. She was almost always the first to volunteer to go on her own on the runs into town for groceries or more renovation supplies. Over those weeks though Laura couldn’t help but notice how little she talked as Dakota, River, Olive, and Azure threw jokes, barbs, and potential baby names across the house at each other. It was nearly two months of renovations before Natasha smiled at a joke directed to her, and another two weeks after that before she started to join in with her own dry and deadpan humor. The first time she joked around with one of the circus folk Laura wanted to cheer.

For her part Laura mainly sat, talked, or cooked. As she got rounder the lot of them got more likely to direct her away from the areas they were working in and back to areas they considered safer. Then suddenly nearly eight months after they’d started, about the time Laura started feeling ready to explode, the whole thing was finally done and all that was left was to buy furniture.

As Dakota, River, Olive, and Azure packed their cook stoves, chairs, and various bits back into their RVs Laura walked, or waddled really, around her new home. She looked around at the new walls (sunshine yellow), new floors (a mix of brown fake woods), and the new kitchen (shiny and stocked) and wondered what kind of life she would make here.

 

—

 

In the moments after labor Laura found herself worried as her baby didn’t scream. Then just as the doctors started to frown he let out a noise, an irritable sort of hiccup, and started crying. It was a quiet sort of cry, the kind that Laura would have expected of a much older child than her newborn, but it was a cry and she felt the relief like a physical thing. When the doctors wrapped him and handed him to her his face looked so red and squishy she felt a pang of anxiety.

“Oh, Cooper, what am I going to do?” She stared down at his face worry lines already creasing hers as the doctors left the room. Clint and Natasha were off on a mission somewhere in a location she wasn’t supposed to know about recovering some data S.H.I.E.L.D. had decided was suddenly relevant. That wasn’t what Laura was worried about though, this tiny human in her arms was so much more frightening.

He frowned up at her and made another irritable sort of hiccup.

“I don’t know if I’ll be much good at all this you know.” She said in what she hoped was a reasonable sort of tone. “My parents didn’t do all that much that would teach me how to be a parent.”

The doctors came back after she’d fed him to collect him and take him off for his first check up. They left some nurses in their wake to help Laura get cleaned up, and into comfortable clothes.

“It’s natural to be worried you know.” One of the nurses said as Laura frowned towards the door. “But your baby will be just fine, we’ve some fantastic doctors here.”

“That’s not-”

“It’s her first I bet.” Another nurse piped up a knowing smirk on her face. “My sister had that same look on her face when she had her first.”

“Ah,well that’s easy love, just keep him warm and fed and he’ll be alright.” The first nurse squeezed Laura’s arm as they helped her back into the bed. “Boys aren’t quite as tough as girls but all babies are plenty tough.”

“And yours is calm already and he’s only hours old.” The third and quietest nurse smiled at her. “I doubt he’ll be any trouble at all.”

Laura smiled and nodded without bothering to correct them one the details of her worry. They didn’t need to know any more than they already did about her. Besides there was a good chance that plenty of people with terrible parents had gone on to be just fine as parents themselves. She closed her eyes and tried not to think about the people who’d gone the other way as she drifted off to sleep.

 

—

 

For the first few days after Clint and Natasha made it back to the farm, Clint hardly put Cooper down. He frowned and murmured as often as he smiled and cooed, and eventually Laura took Cooper out of his arms and frowned at him until he looked down at the ground.

“It’s just…” He trailed off and looked between her and the baby. “Well, he’s mine right?”

“No he’s Agent White’s of course he’s yours.” Laura rolled her eyes, she knew that wasn’t really what was bothering him but she couldn’t help laughing at it.

“I know, I know.” Clint waved his hand and frowned at the ground a moment before tucking all but his thumb and pinky in towards his palm and moving his hand between himself and Cooper. “What if he’s like me?”

“Stubborn, foolish, too good with a bow?” Laura’s smile softened as Clint’s face fell. She reached out with one hand to cup his cheek. “Clint, love, he’ll be okay.”

“But what if he gets my shit ears and bad coping skills?” He seemed at once trying to mumble and speak to fast for her to hear but Laura was not the one who had trouble picking up on words.

“He’ll be okay.” She repeated and gently pulled him towards her with the one hand on his cheek until their foreheads were pressed together. “He’ll have you, me, and Aunt Nat to look out for him. Though you didn’t end up to badly yourself, other than the tendency to run into danger to protect people you don’t even know.”

 “I don’t…” He stumbled to a stop and moved slightly to press his head into the crook of her neck, leaving enough room between them for Cooper who was still nested in one of Laura’s arms. She moved her free hand to rub slow circles on Clint’s back before answering.

“We’ll be okay.” Laura said it with a conviction she was still trying to convince herself she felt.

 

—

 

Less than a week after Natasha and Clint headed back to New York, what little time they’d been able to escape unnoticed from the city entirely used up, Laura found a flyer in the grocery store for a circus. She grinned as she recognized the photos they’d used on it.

“Well Cooper, I suppose it’s about time you met your father’s family.” A lady walking past gave her a strange look but Cooper gurgled and Laura went back to getting the groceries she needed. The town’s grocery store and the family who owned it made her miss Jack and his little grocery across from the rundown apartment she’d done so much in.

Two days after seeing the flier, Laura tucked Cooper into his sling and went walking until she found the field that the Circus’ RVs were parked in. A worried looking farmer frowned at them, like he wasn’t certain yet if he liked the idea of renting out one of his fields, and she slipped around him without him ever realizing she was there. A few of the new hires frowned at the townie walking among them until Dakota and River squealed and ran towards her.

“Laura!” River skidded to a halt in front of her with an easy grin on their face. “Little guy finally got out huh?”

“He’s so cute! River look at his tiny nose!” Dakota did a cartwheel around Laura and River laughed.

“They drank my coffee instead of their tea this morning.”

“You swapped our mugs!” Dakota frown, hands on their hips and turned to Laura. “They put their coffee in my mug!”

“You two are ridiculous, you missed your calling in comedy.” The grin on Laura’s face felt easier than it had in months as the two of them hooked their arms in hers and started walking to go show her and Cooper off to the rest of the circus.

They found Clary at the center of it all before they found anyone else, she declined to hold him but smiled down at the baby with warmth in her face. “He’s a quiet one all right, I’ll bet good money he grows up to be careful.”

“And where would he get that from?” River snorted.

“Yeah, Cooper! Where in the world did you get ideas about being careful?” Dakota shook one of his tiny fists and he let out a noise they clearly interpreted as laughter.

“Certainly not from his parents.” Clary winked at Laura as she said it, laying a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You’ll want to head towards the games area next.”

“Let’s go!” Dakota and River had her by the arms again and whisked her off past all the people she knew on sight but not quite by name. They grinned and waved, some of them gave her thumbs up, and she could only imagine what stories were going around the circus about her and Clint.

“They call you two the archer and his ‘lovely young lady’ sometimes.” Dakota grinned when they noticed one of the waves.

“Except for the ones who call you two Hawkeye and his friend.” River added with a tone that might have been mistook for thoughtful if someone didn’t notice the laughter in their voice.

“I think Hawkeye and Sharpeye is my favourite though.”

“Course this is all because you weren’t with us long enough to get a proper name.”

“Quit teasing the poor girl.” Laura looked up, and up and up, to see Olive standing on her stilts, wispy blonde hair blowing out behind her like a banner. Then she saw the grin on Olive’s face that was just a touch more kind than wicked. “She knows everyone calls them Hawkeye squared.”

“Come now that’s just silly.” Azure was not walking on her stilts just yet, much to the relief of Laura’s neck. “Archer and Watcher is a much better duo name for them.”

Laura tried to think of something to say but instead of words laughter fell out. In the sling Cooper babbled which was really the best distraction as within minutes both Olive and Azure were ground level and in front of her so they could coo at the baby. She pulled him out of the sling so they could pass him around and River took him first, their arms twisting automatically to support and comfort him.

“What a quiet boy you are, wonder where that comes from?” They grinned down at Cooper who cooed back and reached up to pat their nose. River turned to their twin with a wide grin and held him out slightly. “Here Dakota, he’s not as wiggly as cousin Eric’s girl.”

“No one is as wiggly as little Alice.” Dakota chuckled and took him from River. Unlike River though they held Cooper so gently Laura was worried he might just decide to roll over.

“He’s not made of glass hon.” She laughed and adjusted Dakota’s grip gently. “Trust me, he’s more likely to bruise you than you are him.”

After they’d had their grip adjusted though Dakota looked so nervous Laura took pity on them and transferred Cooper to Azure. However Azure held him just as nervously as Dakota had and Laura exchanged amused glances with River as she transferred him again into Olive’s arms.

“Whoa, he’s all squishy still.” Olive looked down at him and Laura held back more laughter at the picture they made. It looked almost like someone had handed a bag of bread to a child and told them to be careful. Both her arms were almost completely flat and they were beside each other rather than overlapping.

“Olive curve your arms.” River said as they moved to shift Olive’s arms, unlike Laura they weren’t trying at all to hide the laughter in their voice. “See like that, he’s a baby not a box.”

“Come and sit, we’ve nearly finished this area’s set up. We can fill you in on the gossip while we work.” Azure linked their arm with Laura’s and headed towards a picnic table they’d set up nearby.

 

—

 

Several weeks later while Clint was showering off his and Nat’s latest mission Laura handed Natasha baby Cooper without much thought as she moved through the kitchen. She was cooking and she didn’t want him near the stove while the burners were hot. Once the pots were in place and she looked back over she frowned slightly. Natasha held him like she wasn’t sure what he was made of and looked down at him like he scared her. The expression seemed very out of place on Natasha’s face especially since Laura was well aware that most in S.H.I.E.L.D. genuinely believed nothing scared Natasha. Of course they only dealt with the Natasha who acted like a weapon and not the very real woman who Laura dealt with.

“He’s squishy.” Natasha said it like a question when she noticed Laura looking at her. In her arms Cooper was making a fussy annoyed sort of noise that wasn’t quite a cry. Though he rarely did cry unless he was properly hungry.

“Well yes, he’s still a baby, babies are squishy.” Laura walked back to her and adjusted Natasha’s arms and her hands, until Cooper settled with his regular annoyed sort of hiccup. “There you go.”

Natasha continued to frown down at the baby in her arms and Laura waited. Clint could be teased into his worried confessions but Natasha needed time and quiet. After a few minutes, as Cooper yawned and went to sleep with one fist stuck in his mouth, Laura went to check on the food. She was nearly finished cooking when Natasha spoke again.

“What if I hurt him? I wasn’t designed for this sort of thing.” Her voice was quiet but Laura could hear the truth in her words.

“None of us were.” Laura turned down the heat on the stove before she walked over to perch on the counter near Natasha. “You and I were intended for specific purposes, and Clint was never kept long enough for anyone to teach him about looking after babies.”

“But I’m…” Natasha trailed off but Laura knew the end of that sentence even if she didn’t finish it herself.

“You’re just you, Nat, that’s all any of us are.” Laura tucked Natasha’s hair back behind her ear. “Besides which Cooper already trusts you.”

Natasha frowned down at the sleeping boy like she wanted to lecture him about that exact fact.

Before she could respond however Clint walked into the room and looped an arm around her neck and smiled down at Cooper like he’d never seen anything better in his life. “Isn’t he beautiful Nat? He’s so lucky to have all three of us.”

Natasha made a noise that could have meant anything but Laura could see a new sort of look in Natasha’s eyes. It was similar to the look she’d had years ago when Laura had told her she was a child and not a weapon. It meant re-calibrations.

 

—

 

Three months after Cooper’s birth Laura woke up with the worst nausea she’d had in ages coupled with an extremely sore chest, and she let out a string of curses that spanned every language she knew. Then Cooper started crying and she climbed out of bed and gathered him out of his crib.

“You know what Cooper? I might just kill your dad.” Laura said it in a conversational tone while Cooper tried to stuff his fist in his mouth and she headed towards the kitchen to get him a bottle.

Cooper cooed at her as she opened the fridge. Having abandoned his attempts to eat his own fist he was now waving both hands around in the air.

“Yes that’s right, if I am pregnant I hope the next one is as easy to look after as you are.” Laura smiled at him and Cooper grinned back at her banging on the bottle as she held it out for him.

Laura pulled out her cell phone and called Clint with video on. Within seconds he was blinking at her from the screen his face still half pressed into the pillow on his bed in New York.

“Clint, love?” Laura balanced the phone on the counter so she could hold Cooper’s bottle properly.

“Mmm?” Was his extremely eloquent answer as he turned slightly and rubbed sleep out of his eyes.

“You’re going to want to be awake for this news.” She’d seen to it that his phone had captions running along the bottom of the screen but he couldn’t very well read those if he wasn’t awake.

“Mm awake.” He pulled himself up into a sitting position and picked up the phone so it was face level. “Wazit?”

“I haven’t taken the test yet but I think I might be pregnant.” Laura said it slowly, carefully.

“Sorry, phone must be broken.” Clint blinked again, clearly properly awake now. “You need to take a test for what?”

“Pregnancy love, I might be pregnant again.” She repeated herself smiling softly at him. “I debated killing you for it but Cooper pointed out this one might be as easy a baby as he is. Plus, I did say I wanted more kids.”

“Yeah but…” Clint trailed off and rubbed at his face again before continuing. “This is a little sooner than we’d planned is all Laur’.”

“I’ll let you know what the test says love.” Laura blew a kiss at him. “Go get some coffee.”

“Yeah.” Clint nodded and lifted one hand to where she could see it with his two middle fingers down and the rest extended.

“Love you too.” She reached out to flick off the call and looked down at Cooper who’d finished his bottle. “Well Coop, I suppose we better run out to the store once mum is dressed then huh?”

 

 


	11. The Style of Changing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laura Barton settles into a life that is safer than any she's ever known

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks always to Lindy for wonderful editing and enthusiasm for my marvel stories!
> 
> My version of Kate Bishop might have very little in common with the comics in all likelihood as I’ve never read her’s. I’m mostly just making her up as I go along.   
> As always I don’t speak Russian myself so any phrases I find are pulled off of ‘learn Russian for free’ sites or google translate.   
> Also this chapter spans like 4-5 years

“We could just tell a couple people, just Fury and Hill, a couple of agents they trust!” Clint stood in front of her with his arms crossed, a bit of sawdust from his last reno project still in his hair.

“No.” Laura said, her tone as even as she could make it.

“Things are changing out there Laur’, weird shit keeps happening.” He was pleading now, Laura was glad Nat had taken Cooper out to play while Lila was napping. She didn’t like fighting in front of him. “Please, I just want you to be safe.”

“You know as well as I do that one wrong person finding out would put a huge target on this farm.” Laura crossed her arms.

“We can-”

“I will not let my kids grow up not knowing if the next person through that door is a threat or not!” Laura snapped, her even tone gone as she pointed towards their front door. “They are going to grow up feeling safe in their own home!”

“But-”

“Clint, S.H.I.E.L.D. has almost never been useful for me. Plus, they’re not designed to help children.” She shook her head and saw the fight leak out of him. “I went to S.H.I.E.L.D. as a kid, back when I first figured out what my parents were.”

“You never said…”

“It didn’t seem important.” She shrugged and sank into the chair at her counter. “I told the agent who spoke to me that my parents were part of Hydra, that I’d found files on current Hydra operations, all I wanted was a way out, and a new name. They told me they’d ‘watch and see’ and sent me home.”

“Wouldn’t there be a file or something?”

“There was, I looked it up once we were in S.H.I.E.L.D.” Laura nodded. “A file on a girl named Lauretta who came to them with information they were unable to verify. There was barely any investigation and nothing was ever really done about it. The file labeled it a child’s fantasy.”

He nodded after a moment. “Alright, if you’re sure you can keep this place safe yourself.”

“Well, I managed on my own for all the years before.” Laura lifted on shoulder and smiled though it felt tired. “And I’ve got more reason than I ever did before.”

 

—

 

Laura was at the grocery store when she first heard chatter about the new family in town. She heard the whispers as she walked around with Lila in a sling and Cooper toddling on her heels and sorted facts from rumors automatically. Facts: The family was well off or possibly rich, single dad, two daughters. Rumors: Mum died tragically, or heroically, or gruesomely, the girls were standoffish/clearly not meant for small town living, and the dad had bought a dozen of the surrounding farms. She added an extra bag of frozen veggies to her cart as the two ladies behind her discussed the father’s appearance.

“Mama.” Cooper pulled on her pant leg and pointed to a bag of frozen carrots that were cut with a curvy knife. He put his hand near his face, almost a fist except his thumb and pinky were extended and wigged it across the front of his face.

“Yes those are silly, should we get them instead of this one?” She held up the bag of mixed veggies she’d added and Cooper grinned, nodding enthusiastically. She swapped the bags of veggies and headed off down the aisle, as she turned the corner she nearly ran into a girl with dark hair and narrow blue eyes, made narrower by the glare she was sending towards the ladies Laura had just walked away from. She couldn’t have been older than ten or eleven.

“Sorry.” She stepped out of the way, closer to the shelf, and Laura smiled at her.

“You one of the new kids in town?” Laura leaned on the cart to come down to the girl’s level as she gave a small nod. “I was the new kid until you got here, did you need something from that aisle?”

“Papa wants peas, but they keep talking about us.” She sent another glare towards the ladies. “If I hear one more person talk about how cute I am…”

“Watch Cooper for a moment, I’ll go grab your peas.” Laura nudged Cooper towards the girl and headed back down the aisle. She snagged peas easily chuckling when the ladies commented about the forgetfulness of new mothers. She held them out to the girl once she was around the corner again. “Here you go, need help finding anything else?”

“Papa gave me a list.” She held it out towards Laura who scanned it easily.

“Follow me, I doubt they’ll notice you as much with me.” She winked with an easy grin. “Plus, Cooper likes you.” Copper hanging onto the girl’s hand made it clear that she was correct.

The girl nodded and followed Laura around the grocery with her own basket slowly filling up. No one commented on her the whole time with the exception of the old lady at the counter who gave Laura a knowing smile.

“Picking up more strays are you girl?”

“Ma’am I don’t pick up strays, they just follow me home.” Laura grinned at the familiar exchange, it was the same one they had whenever Clint or Natasha were in town.

The lady chuckled and rang them both up easily, waving as they headed for the door.

“Do you have a way home kiddo?” Laura raised an eyebrow as she headed towards her truck.

“Papa said the walk would be good for me.” From the expression she was making as she looked out at the street she disagreed with her papa.

“Want a ride? You can direct me to your place.”

“It’s out that way.” She pointed out of the town.

Laura nodded and left the passenger door open once she’d gotten Cooper and Lila into their car seats. By the time her groceries were secured in the back of the truck and she got in the driver's side the girl was in the passenger seat with a ball cap pulled low over her face. It was the battered old cap Laura had kept on her car dashboards her whole life.

“You’re out of town?” Laura clarified as she pulled away from the little grocery.

“Yeah.” The girl glanced up and pointed again. “That way.”

“That way it is.” Laura nodded as she realized she still didn’t know the girl’s name. “I’m Laura by the way, Laura Barton, Cooper and Lila are the kids names.”

“Kate Bishop.” Kate gave her the smallest grin from under the brim of the hat. They didn’t speak much for the rest of the drive, Kate gave directions mostly by pointing. Soon they’d pulled up to a little property with a new mailbox out front and a house that looked like it had been ordered out of a catalog. She stopped in the drive as an older man stepped onto the porch with a frown.

“It’s me, Papa.” Kate called as she climbed out of the truck and headed towards the porch. Laura stepped out of the truck to smile at the man.

“Give the lady back her hat.” He frowned down at her. “What have I told you about stranger’s cars?”

“She’s not a stranger, everyone in town knows her and she helped me avoid having to flip someone over my shoulder.” Kate crossed her arms but headed back towards Laura once her bag of groceries was set down on the porch.

“You can keep the hat if you want Kate, it doesn’t actually fit me anymore, hasn’t for years.” Laura waved it off and walked up to hold her hand out to Kate’s papa. “I’m Laura Barton. The townsfolk are nice enough, but they’re all excited about new people and they forget most kids don’t want to be constantly fussed at. I just happened to be shopping at the same time as your daughter.”

“I don’t believe in coincidences.” He shook her hand anyway. “Derek Bishop.”

“A decent policy.” Laura gave a one shouldered shrug and headed back towards her truck. She gestured down the road as she got in. “I live three dirt road turn offs down that way if you need anything.”

“Thank you!” Kate waved from the porch and Laura could see another girl standing in a window who didn’t look much older than Kate.

Laura waved as she headed off, not expecting much to come of it. Which is why she was surprised to find a set of laminated cards in her mailbox less than a week later. Babysitting cards from both Kate, and a Susan Bishop who had to be the older girl, and a card that read “Derek Bishop, for any publishing needs contact at” with a phone number and email listed. She chuckled to herself and tacked all three cards on the bulletin board she kept beside her front door.

 

—

 

Lila had started speaking very early, as if to make up for the fact that Cooper rarely spoke aloud. Since they were born Laura had been speaking to them in a mix of English and Russian, if they wanted she’d teach them more as they got older but those were her languages, her roots. Despite the fact that she largely wanted to escape from most of her upbringing the languages she had learned were one of the few parts she wanted to keep. It was also Natasha’s language and that helped on days Laura couldn’t hear the words of it without thinking of her parents.

The first time Laura hear Natasha murmuring to the kids in Russian she laughed quietly to herself, Natasha was cooing baby talk at them and clearly didn’t want Clint to understand what exactly she was saying.

The next time Laura noticed Russian she wasn’t personally speaking it was when a barely eighteen month old Lila running to the door as Natasha came through it. “Привет! Привет!”

“Привет, что нового?” Natasha answered, without seeming to think about it. Then she registered what she’d said, and that Lila was replying and looked up to frown at Laura.

“Lila’s good at languages.” Laura shrugged not bothering to look innocent as Lila spoke English and Russian alongside each other like they were interchangeable. Clint was looking like he was regretting not having Laura teach him Russian all those years ago.

“Must be.” Natasha nodded. Lila tugged on Natasha’s shirt and babbled out a story request where only ‘want’ and the title of the story were actually in English.

A couple days after Natasha and Clint headed back to the city that time Laura got a package in the mail that contained Russian flashcards, and a couple of dvds of Russian kids cartoons. The next few times Natasha came home she talked to Cooper and Lila almost exclusively in Russian and Clint sulked and poked through the flashcards that Lila had claimed.

It didn’t take before long the two were asking for Russian lullabies or stories at bedtime even more often than they were English ones.

 

—

 

Lila was nearly three when Laura wondered if maybe Clint himself didn’t even notice the way he looked at Natasha, or maybe he was pretending not to notice. So she watched them, both at home and through S.H.I.E.L.D. files. The video footage of them showed the same thing she saw at home, when they had handlers other than Coulson they often remarked on their camaraderie and protectiveness of each other. Coulson didn’t say it in so many words but it was littered throughout his reports if you knew how he spoke.

Laura called a contact and arranged for Coulson to get a fruit basket of strawberries with a note that read “it’s a report not a story, thought I taught you that already”. She sent one to Hill as well, avocados and a note about making her handler’s write proper reports.

Then Natasha got sent on a solo mission and Clint came home alone. As soon as he was done putting the kids to bed he came downstairs and blurted it out before Laura had a chance to ask him about it.

“Laur? I think I might love Nat?” He looked so worried about it Laura couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled up. “I’m not joking Laura, I mean I love you too, I just…”

He looked so lost for a moment that she reached over and took his hand. “Oh, Clint you fool.”

“What?” He went from lost and worried to perplexed as she kissed his knuckled.

“Did you never realize you can love more than one person at a time?” She raised her eyebrows and he frowned.

“But wouldn’t, doesn’t that make…” He made a noise that could have been either frustration or confusion.

“Unless you think it does I don’t see why it would change at all the way you feel about me.”

“You aren’t, you don’t mind?” He ran a hand through his hair. “Really?”

“I really don’t mind, love.” Laura laughed and tugged him towards the couch. “As long as you don’t mind that I’m also in love with Nat.”

“You? You’re?” He blinked at her.

“Why do you think I made sure we had multiple spare rooms upstairs?”

“For… oh, oh I’m an idiot.” He rubbed at his forehead and dropped down on the couch next to her. “I’ve been an idiot.”

“That’s hardly your fault.” She leaned against him as he wrapped his arms around her. “I never did say anything.”

“Why not?”

“I’ve told you about my parents right?” She lifted her head to smirk at him and he nodded. “They didn’t approve of love in general and certainly not any even remotely queer love. I learned not to talk about any of it.”

“I just never thought of it.” Clint kissed the top of her head gently as she settled against him again. “Thank you.”

“You hardly need to thank me for this.”

“No, but it feels like the right words.”

“Fool.” She mumbled as she felt herself slipping into sleep already, on the couch barely into evening.

“Love you too.” He pressed another kiss to the top of her head and Laura drifted off.

 

—

 

“We don't recommend-”

“I'm aware that the state doesn't recommend having children skip grades.” Laura was entirely tired of this conversation. It was one she'd been having in circles now for weeks; if they didn't let her put Lila in soon, Cooper would be going to school without her. “Just give me the papers I need to sign, or let me know what tests she needs to take to go into kindergarten early.”

“Ma'am,” he said the word in a tone that implied she might have been a tad slow on the uptake.

“I swear I will put them both in school in the city. You have three seconds to decide.” Laura slipped into what Kate jokingly referred to as her ‘angry mom’ voice.

The man across the counter frowned for a full second before he reached down and got a handful of papers out of a drawer. “You'll have to take her to Dr. Alder on Birch Street to verify that she will adjust fine. Once she's signed then you sign these papers and bring them back to me.”

“Thank you.” She took the papers from him more gently than her tone would imply and turned on her heel.

Outside of the building Kate (14) was letting Lila (4) and Cooper (5) run circles around her. Lila was chattering and occasionally translating for Cooper who still signed more than he spoke. They both squealed as they caught sight of Laura walking over to them.

“Mama!” She leaned down to scoop both of them up as they thudded into her legs. Lila leaned out to grin at her. “Do I get to go to school with Cooper mama? Did they say yes?”

“We just have to go talk to a doctor and then you should be able to.” Laura nodded heading towards the truck with Kate on her heels.

“Do they need to look at my bones?” Lila blinked up at her, trying her best to look serious.

“Not that kind of doctor little love. Into your seats, both of you.” She dropped them in the driver's seat and they scrambled back into their car seats and buckled up. “This one is going to ask you questions and make sure you’ll fit into kindergarten okay.”

“I’ll be fine if Cooper’s there.” Lila shrugged her tiny shoulders. “Like in ballet class, Cooper is fine ‘cause I’m there. Oh, wait no Cooper says he likes ballet. What about soccer? Yeah, like in soccer then.”

Laura chuckled as she drove towards the town’s psychologist. Kate had twisted around in the seat and was tossing signs back and forth with the kids as they drove; the rest of the drive was quiet except for the giggling.

As they walked into the building, Lila took Cooper’s hand and didn’t let go as the doctor introduced herself to the lot of them.

“Hello children, I’m Dr. Alder. You two must be Lila and Cooper. The principle called to tell me about you.” She shot a perplexed look at Laura before her eyes landed on Kate and her whole face softened. It looked almost like pity and Laura felt a stab of annoyance. “And the young Miss Bishop, how are you today?”

“Fine.” The words fell like stones; it was the first time Laura had ever heard her sound like a proper teenager.

“Well then, Lila would you like to come with me?” Dr. Alder stretched a hand out towards her and Lila took half a step closer to Cooper. There was something like judgment on Dr. Alder’s face, right until Lila spoke.

“No thank you, not without Cooper or mama.” She shook her head but her tone was the politest one Laura had ever heard her use.

“I am supposed to talk to the two of you separately.” Dr. Alder frowned like she wasn’t sure what to do with this stubborn four year old.

“No, thank you.” Lila repeated at the same time as Cooper signed it. Dr. Alder’s eyes tracked the movement of Cooper’s hand and her frown went thoughtful.

“Does Cooper speak English?” Her tone held something like disapproval and the question was directed at Laura but she let Lila and Cooper answer it.

“Only when the words don’t catch.” Lila shrugged and Cooper simply brought his thumb, middle, and pointer fingers together to sign no. “Signing is easier and he can use my voice.”

“He should be speaking by now Ms Barton, if he’s not there could be something wrong-”

“There’s nothing wrong with Cooper!” Lila snapped it out before Laura had even figured out how to phrase her response. “Some people just don’t talk lots.”

“Cooper is capable of speaking, he simply doesn’t.” Laura put a hand on Lila’s shoulder to quiet her but she could feel her daughter’s rage like a physical thing. “It doesn’t make him wrong, just different. He has already been checked for hearing loss and vocal problems, he just prefers to sign.”

“Dad signs all the time and no one gets mad at him for it.” Lila muttered despite the hand Laura had on her shoulder.

“Dad is nearly deaf without his hearing aids, little love.” She said it quietly before looking up again at Dr. Alder and continuing in a normal tone. “Which is why both of my children have had extensive testing done on their hearing.”

“Yes, well-”

“Now, I’d recommend you simply sign the papers so we can leave.” Laura held out the papers she needed the doctor to sign but she just frowned at Laura’s hand instead.

“I should really speak to them separately.”

“Do either of them look willing to converse with you?” Laura sighed and shook the papers slightly. “I’m not going to force them to go into a room alone with you if they don’t want to.”

“Fine, then go.”

“Alright, I’ll go to the city and put them in school there. Your school can lose the funding of two extra kids.” Laura let go of Lila’s shoulder and she immediately turned and walked towards the door with Cooper. Kate followed the two kids out as soon as they’d past her.

The doctor seemed to be having some kind of massive internal struggle and Laura took her time leaving just to watch the expressions on her face.

“Fine.” The doctor said it as Laura turned to walk towards the door. “Fine, I’ll sign them.”

“Fantastic.” Laura’s smile was nowhere close to warm as she handed the papers over. Once the papers were signed she tucked them into an envelope she’d pulled out of her truck.

Lila was grinning ear to ear by the time Laura got out of the building, they’d clearly been watching through the windows.

“Mama, she signed them.” She tugged on Laura’s sleeve. “That means I get to go to school here and with Cooper right? Not all the way into the city?”

“That’s right.” Laura smiled as she opened the truck doors. “In you get little loves, we’ve got to drop these papers off at the school before we go home.”

“She didn’t want to be the reason the school didn’t get two kids worth of funding, huh?” Kate asked quietly as she slipped into the passenger seat.

“That she didn’t.”

 

—

 

When Laura looked at the clock on her bedside table and saw it blinking [4:32] at her she got out of bed as carefully as she could and padded downstairs to the kitchen. If she wasn’t asleep yet she doubted she’d get there tonight, so she went to put on the kettle for tea. By the glow of the little light above the stove Laura could see the shape of a person. Before she had a chance to startle though she recognized her.

“Sorry, Laura.” Natasha’s voice was softer than usual and Laura just shook her head.

“Its okay love, I’m making tea do you want some?”

“Why do you do that?”

“What do you mean?” Laura frowned at the kettle, wondering what about making tea was suddenly confusing for Natasha.

“Call me ‘love’.” Natasha was frowning at her, and Laura was suddenly realizing that for all she and Clint had talked about it they’d never actually had a conversation with Natasha.

“I just thought you knew.” Laura rubbed at her forehead for a moment. “Nat you’re, we… I call you love for the same reason I call Clint love. You’re part of my family.”

Natasha’s face went carefully blank and Laura shrugged as the kettle boiled and she poured it into the teapot.

“I mean only if you want it, however you want to be part of it.” Laura found she couldn’t quite look at Natasha’s face so she looked down at her own hands instead. “I love you and so does Clint, and I suppose we both just thought you’d just know somehow.”

“You…?” Natasha’s voice was as carefully controlled as her face was, like she thought it might be a trick. Laura was suddenly strongly reminded of a younger Natasha watching her make tea with careful eyes like it might be a test.

“I love you, have for years now actually.” Laura lifted on shoulder and smiled softly. “I’ve never been much good at dealing with these things though.”

“What about Clint?” Her knuckles were going white against the mug she was holding onto.

“He knows, we talked about it all already. I know he loves you too. Our feelings for you don’t change what we feel for each other.”

Laura heard a sound like sand falling and she walked across the kitchen and gently peeled Natasha’s hands off the mug. Natasha looked down at the mug and the tiny fractures now running around the edges of it. “Sorry.”

“It’s just a mug love, I just didn’t want you to shatter it.” Laura traced her thumb gently over the palm of Natasha’s hand. “It would have cut your hands up something awful.”

Natasha twisted her hands slightly so she was holding onto Laura’s and squeezed gently. Laura moved around the counter without letting go so she could pull her close. She let go of one of Natasha’s hands to wrap an arm gently around her instead and Natasha closed what little distance was between them to press her forehead into Laura’s shoulder.

“I’ve got you.” Laura wrapped her other arm around Natasha as well and held her close. “We’ve got you.”

“Gotta talk to Clint.” Natasha mumbled into Laura’s shoulder.

“Tomorrow love, we can let him sleep for now.” She rubbed gentle circles on Natasha’s back. “We’ll all talk tomorrow.”

 

—

 

Laura frowned at the news as a man she vaguely remembered from her days in S.H.I.E.L.D. gave the wrong acronym and name to the reporter. He waved a hand and spoke about gas lines and water supplies and verbally danced away from questions about the fence behind him. She remembered giving orders once to do similar things but never to this extent.

She shut off the TV and went into her study. Out of a locked drawer she pulled a laptop that looked more old and battered than it was: the only thing she'd taken with her from S.H.I.E.L.D. Once it was awake she started looking, searching the S.H.I.E.L.D. databases for whatever was currently happening. When that proved to have too many walls around it, she checked the less guarded places where S.H.I.E.L.D. agents occasionally left chatter. That also came up empty. There was plenty of chatter of course, dozens of rambling conversations, but someone had finally taught them a code Laura didn't already know, so she couldn't decipher it.

She turned the laptop off and put it back in her locked cupboard. This much noise and chatter was never good, especially as secret as they were keeping it.

She spent most of that night drinking tea and staring out the windows into the dark of her fields.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Laura and Derek frequently have tea/coffee/drinks and talk about their hellion children. Their friendship is mostly based around their kids and the fact that Laura gives not even one shit about who Derek is in the city or how important he is.


	12. The Week from Hell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fury's busy Week, aka the week I'd quit S.H.I.E.L.D., aka Laura's week from Hell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finally got to where MCU starts, I’m so thrilled & for sake of ease I’m starting Fury’s Busy Week on a Monday.

 

Laura's Monday had started out fairly normal for a school holiday. Clint and Natasha were both out on missions and she took the kids to the Bishop’s house so she could have tea with an adult and the kids could distract his teenagers. She was home by two so she could get check in calls from Clint and Natasha.

Clint had been sent out to new Mexico on a hunch of Fury’s; Laura had rolled her eyes as Clint called to tell her about the girl he’d been sent to watch. He described Jane Foster as brilliant, distracted, and a storm chaser. The readings were real enough, he said but the girl and her assistant didn’t seem like the kind of people who needed S.H.I.E.L.D. to watch them.

Laura felt worse for Natasha though. Since Stark had decided to appoint Pepper Potts CEO of his company, quite the promotion from his assistant, Natasha had been sent to babysit. Natasha called often since the start of that assignment to complain about arrogant rich boys and the fact that she was supposed to keep Pepper at a distance.  

That night, Laura flicked on the tv and there were explosions above what she recognized as Tony’s house in Malibu- a mansion more than a house. She unmuted the news.

“Sources remain unsure of what exactly caused the fight between Iron man, Tony Stark, and his once friend Colonel James Rupert Rhodes. They’re now fighting above the billionaires mansion in what appear to be-” Laura muted the news again she was quite capable of seeing that both Rhodes, who the media had always claimed was a calming influence on Stark, and Stark himself were wearing iron man suits. Though, Rhodes was in a much more logical grey and near black colour scheme.

Laura shook her head and changed the channel to some new comedy thing. In a few hours she’d be able to try and get into the S.H.I.E.L.D. reports about it. If not she’d be able to ask Natasha about it tomorrow.

“Mama, why was the metal men fighting?” Lila popped her head over the back of the couch to peer at the TV even though it no longer showed what she was asking about.

“I’m not sure darling.” Laura shrugged and got up to scoop Lila up. She’d long ago decided not to explain things to children if she didn’t understand them herself yet. “Little kids are supposed to be in bed right now though.”

“But I wanna watch.” She pouted but allowed herself to be carried back to bed.

Careful not to wake Cooper as they went into the room, Laura tucked Lila back into her bed and kissed her on the forehead. “Goodnight, little love.”

“G’night mama.” Lila yawned as Laura walked back out of the room again.

The next day, as far as the news was concerned anyway, was quiet. The news anchors however were thrilled to once again have a reason to point fingers at Tony Stark and all those things he did that they didn’t agree with. Laura, however, was paying much closer attention- her love was trapped in the middle of this after all- and noticed Rhodes in the background of one newscaster’s interview with some military bigwig who seemed largely unconcerned all of a sudden about Tony Stark and his metal suits.

Laura’s phone rang, and before she had a chance to speak Natasha was already going.

“Fury is an idiot, he puts only me on protection detail for this self destructive, manipulative, cunning,-”

“Hello, Love.” Laura let the laughter creep into her voice even as she wanted to immediately call Fury several rather rude names.

“Hello, and then he decided that what Stark really needs is to know that his dad was part of S.H.I.E.L.D.s creation and let’s him into Howard Stark’s personal S.H.I.E.L.D. lockbox because that will cause nothing but good things right?” Natasha sounded more annoyed than Laura had ever heard her before.

“It depends what Stark does with it really.” Laura said after a moment of thought, trying to figure out what Fury was thinking had never been her specialty. “Fury always did seem to like the long gamble though.”

“Well, his long gamble might get us all killed. Tony’s disappeared into his lab with whatever he got from Fury, and S.H.I.E.L.D.-” Natasha grumbled and then there was the sound of doors. “Ah, I’ve got to hang up now. I’ll speak with you some other time.”

“Love you, too.” Laura chuckled as Natasha hung up on her.

Laura went back to watching the data that Clint was feeding her, one he was getting directly from Jane Foster’s lab. Numbers and words scrolled down the page but she couldn’t make heads or tails of it, she’d never really gotten into meteorology or astrophysics in university. Something about it stuck Laura as odd but she couldn’t put her finger on it. So she walked away from the data and the S.H.I.E.L.D. intel, and went out back to where Kate was alternating between making sure Lila and Cooper weren’t dead and practicing shooting a bow.

Wednesday passed in a similar fashion, except instead of just Kate coming over Derek and Susan had joined her. Kate spent most of that day trying to convince her older sister that learning about weapons was fun. Derek and Laura laughed about how different siblings could be over tea and coffee. When Laura glanced at the data Clint had been feeding her, she raised an eyebrow. At some point it went all wonky, all sorts of odd things happening in it, and then it went dead. The readings were just gone. Either Clint had stopped feeding it to her, or his tap on Foster’s machine’s had gone off.

That evening more explosions followed Stark as he landed at Hammer Industries expo. He was almost immediately attacked by both Rhodes in his new and shiny War Machine suit and the large metal drones Hammer Industries had just finished building for the military. The cameras got a glimpse of Pepper storming backstage followed closely by a redhead Laura recognized as Natasha so she waited up for a call. Sure enough late that night, after the fight, and the moment of calm before the final explosion of all the fallen drones Laura’s phone rang with a familiar number flashing on the screen.

“Hey love.” Laura answered it and settled back into her chair with her eyes closed. “What’s the story?”

“If Pepper wasn’t a monogamous type of girl Laura I swear…” Natasha trailed off for a moment and Laura could hear the creak of a couch settling.

“She’s an impressive one for sure.” Not that Laura had ever met her personally but she’d followed Tony Stark’s life fairly closely for several reasons. Pepper Potts had been in the background of it from quite young and through all the worst of it; anyone who could manage to stay that close to Tony was someone Laura would not want to butt heads with.

“At first Hammer Expo was just what we’d expected. Justin Hammer talking about how amazing he and his company were, how they were going to change everything, and we both thought he was just full of it. You know how most of these weapons CEOs are.” From the lift of Natasha’s voice Laura could almost see the way she’d move her hand, like brushing dust away. “Then he reveals the drones and they looked like the old iron man suits on steroids, bigger everything. They’ve got more armor, more weapons, and they’re half again as tall and wide. Then Rhodes comes out, in an iron man suit with bigger more obvious guns attached.”

“That doesn’t sound good.”

“That’s what we thought, too. Especially once Tony flew in, he was playing it up, stand with Rhodes and wave to the crowd style, but he was stiff even for a guy in a metal suit. Then Rhodes gun was aiming at Tony and so were a full set of the drones. Rhodes shouted a warning and then the fight was beyond us for the moment.” Natasha paused for a moment and Laura could hear the clink of a glass. “Everyone was running, but Pepper was moving towards the back of the room and I was right on her tail. Hammer snapped at us to get out of the way and leaned down to mutter something in the tech guy’s ear about bitches, so I slammed his face into the desk. Once he gave me Vanko’s name and told me where he was I took off.”

“And Pepper?”

“Oh, she took charge right away. Shouted Hammer out of the way as I was leaving, called the NYPD, and started barking orders out at the techs.” Natasha’s tone was almost reverent and Laura couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled out of her. “Oh Laur’ you’d have loved it. Happy drove me to Hammer industries and tried to help me take out guards, it was actually almost cute when he took on the first one. By the time I got to the control room for the drones and Rhodes suit though Vanko was gone.”

“His computers?”

“Left entirely intact, he was obviously not as clever as he wanted people to think. I rebooted Rhodes suit and got Tony and Pepper on coms. He’d upgraded his suit when he locked himself in his room, some new power source not the stuff that was killing him anymore. He let slip to Pepper that he’d been dying though, so she yelled at him about that too.” She let out that puff of breath that was her version of laughter before continuing. “Listening to Rhodes and Tony on the coms was like listening to children, but they got the job done. Took out the drones and then Vanko when he arrived in his own version of the suit.”

“Everyone’s trying to make one these days huh?”

“Not well, usually. Once Vanko was out though it was like a switch was flipped and all the drones went to self destruct. And, well, you saw that on TV I imagine.”

“Yes, last I checked though death count was still zero. Lots of injured but no one’s died yet.”

“That’s all Pepper, she had the place evacuating and when the NYPD were there they basically just followed her orders. She’s got that way about her when she decides to use it. She was the last one in the park.”

“Is she alright?”

“Yeah, she’s fine. Tony airlifted her out.” Natasha yawned. “I should sleep though, SHIELD wants me to report in person tomorrow. Paper reports are apparently not enough for Fury these days.”

“Get some sleep love, it sounds like you had plenty of excitement tonight.” Natasha made a noise that might have been agreement before the line fell silent.

The next morning dawned sunny and Laura looked out at the sky with something like dread settling into her gut. The kind of feeling her parents would have called foolish but she’d learned to trust over the years. She sent the kids into the yard and glanced at the TV in time to see a news report about a hospital that had been broken into somewhere in New Mexico. She raised an eyebrow at that and called Clint just to see if he’d answer.

“Bit busy.” He did but it was clearly on his coms and not via his actual phone.

“In New Mexico?”

“Yeah Puntie Anigo or something, that Jane Foster was onto something alright.” There was a thump and suddenly his voice was far less strained. “There’s some alien hammer none of us can move so we’re building our base around it.”

“Puente Anitguo.” Laura corrected his pronunciation as she watched the tv. It was an interesting name for a town in the middle of a desert. “It means old bridge.”

“We’re in the middle of a desert.” Clint sounded like he was rolling his eyes but Laura was thinking about the name, about old myths. “Gotta switch you off before they realize I’m not using these for SHIELD reasons and try-”

“I have to go stop Lila from jumping off the barn again it’s fine.” Laura frowned out the window at where Lila was currently trying to scale the outside of her old barn and Cooper was standing below her with his arms crossed. “She gets this from you.”

“Yeah she does.” He sounded almost proud of that fact before the line went dead.

Laura rolled her eyes as she went out the side door, as soon as Lila heard footsteps she scrambled down and tried to look innocent. It worked about as well as it usually did, which is to say not at all.

The rest of her day was spent taking the kids walking through their fields and teaching them about the plants that grew wild there. These and these are safe, these will hurt if you touch, these will sting and scratch, and these are deadly she’d list out as she pointed at each one. Cooper listened and watched, committing it to memory and Laura knew when they did this again he’d remember almost all of them accurately. Lila questioned and laughed and joked about the shape of the leaves but Laura knew she’d remember enough to not get to hurt if Laura blinked at the wrong time.

She let them climb in the orchard that stood like a fence between their farm and the neighbor's. Even here Cooper watched and listened more than he did things. He followed below his sister and climbed only once he was certain, of what Laura wasn’t sure. Lila on the other hand scrambled from branch to branch and tree to tree with the kind of ease that came from instinct more than learning. Occasionally she’d call out ‘mama’ and then launch herself out of the tree for Laura to catch. Even though Laura caught her every time she wondered how someone could have that much faith in another person.

After she’d put them both in bed and settled down to read a book her phone rang out the only specific ringtone she’d programed. She was smiling before she’d even answered it.

“So, remember that hammer we found? Well, apparently there’s a very large alien golden retriever who’s rather attached to it.” Clint spoke as soon as she hit the answer button. “I mean he looks human enough except he’s entirely to large and build like he spends all day lifting weights.”

“And he came for the hammer?” Laura tucked her bookmark into the book and set it aside. This sounded like a story.

“Yeah, he did.” He sounded impressed, and more than a little amused. “Lifted the chain-link fence just as a storm hit, ran he way through a dozen guards before Coulson gave the order for eyes up high with a gun. I took the bow of course but it’s the same thing in the end. In any case I go up and ask if Coulson wants me to slow him down or if he’s going to send more guys for him to beat up.”

“Did he laugh?” It was the sort of thing he might have laughed at once, when he was the boy who smiled and did things exactly by the book except when he didn’t.

“Said he’d let me know, which is as close as he gets these days. Point was moot anyway, by that point blondie was standing practically in front of the hammer and I thought he’d have it but the big guy stepped in.” Laura wasn’t sure who exactly ‘the big guy’ was but she’d have bet money Clint knew more about that agent than he was letting on. “They rolled around in the mud for a bit but blondie took him out too, and I told Coulson I was starting to root for him. Blondie, that is.”

“Just starting then?”

“Well, more than I was rooting for our guys anyway.” His voice shifted and she could almost hear the way his shoulder twitched up into a shrug. “Coulson said to wait though and then the damndest thing happened Laur’. Even though the guy clearly came for the hammer he couldn’t lift it either. Damn thing stayed planted in it’s weird dirt pillar. Blondie just fell to his knees and let us bring him in like he hadn’t plowed through those same agents not fifteen minutes before.”

“Grief.”

“Seemed like yeah. Just gets better from there though, then Selvig shows up. That’s Jane Foster’s mentor type right? And he claims blondie is named Donald Blake, has false IDs for him and everything. It’s a real thorough plan really, except this is S.H.I.E.L.D. not some easily fooled organization-”

“Of course.” Laura snorted and Clint let out a laugh on the other end of the line.

“Coulson let him go anyway though, it’s not like the dude was giving us anything. Had him followed of course.”

“Any idea where he went?”

“Last I heard him and Selvig were drinking.” There was that tick in his voice that meant a shrug again. “Ask me they should be getting some rest, something doesn’t feel right about all this.”

“Which means you should be too, love.” Laura said it gently but she couldn’t help but agree. “There’s been a pit in my stomach all day.”

“Hence the call this morning?”

“In part, and I saw there’s been a break in or a break out at a hospital in New Mexico.”

“Probably blondie’s fault, or the good doctors.”

“No doubt. Now go get some rest.”

“You too love, don’t let the kids jump off anything too tall.”

“You know Lila’s the only one who jumps, Cooper’s too careful.” Laura laughed and hung up before Clint could do more than just make a noise of agreement.

The news covered more explosions on Friday as a large robot landed in the middle of small town New Mexico and was fought by what from all accounts appeared to be Norse gods. Laura watched on the news as they played and replayed the footage of the hammer flying down to a man who could only be the one Clint had called blondie over and over. The news was calling him Thor. Laura watched the robot explode as he used the hammer to shoot lightning into it and couldn’t help but agree with the name. Ignored in the background of the footage was a woman who had to be Jane Foster, and a not quite an adult yet, who had to be the assistant. There was also a woman in armor who stood still as a statue behind Thor, Laura looked at her and wondered. The media announcers however glossed over her, and everyone else, in favour of the blond Thor and his hammer.

Laura flicked the news off after dinner and one to many thinly veiled dick jokes. She took Lila and Cooper outside as the sun set to point up at the stars and tell stories. Lila fell asleep curled in her lap but Cooper leaned into her shoulder and listened and looked. Far after both kids should have been tucked into bed Laura finally brought them in, Lila held on one hip and Cooper trailing beside her. Once they were tucked into bed and sleeping Laura called Clint. For all the people in the background of Thor’s fight with the robot there hadn’t been a single visible S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.

“Hello, love.” Clint sounded tired as he answered and she heard a creak that could have been a couch or a bed.

She paused for a moment, trying to decide which question to ask. “You still in New Mexico?”

“Yeah, Fury wants to give Jane Foster back her equipment and offer her funding for storm chasing.” He sighed. “I doubt I’ll be out of here anytime soon.”

“Freeze some fruit to snack on.”

There was silence for a few minutes before Clint spoke again. “Did you hear that Fury is offering Tony a position? But as a consultant only, he’s not suited for team work apparently.”

Laura made a disapproving noise, Tony Stark didn’t need another person asking his opinion. He needed a path, a direction, some sort of cause he could sink his smarts into.

“What would you suggest? Would you have put him on a team?” She could hear the raised eyebrows in Clint’s voice.

“We found a place for Ward and his shifting personality.” Laura shrugged and rubbed at her head. “But no, Stark doesn’t need S.H.I.E.L.D.”

“I don’t think anyone knows what the man needs.”

“A cause, I think. He’s got to find that himself though.” She looked out the window for a moment. “S.H.I.E.L.D. collected that robot already then?”

“Oh, as soon as they cleared out the cameras. They’ve got cleanup crews going through the town as well, repairing damage and reassuring people with some almost believable lie.”

“As you do.”

Clint made a noise of agreement that changed into something more like a yawn halfway through.

“That’s my cue, it’s time for bed I think.” Laura smiled softly. “Get some sleep love.”

“You too.”

Saturday Laura took the kids into town where they ran circles around her as she did the shopping. Neither went far and they didn’t grab things off the shelves, so she let them run underfoot. It earned her glares and tuts from most of the other folk who were shopping but she just grinned. As far as Laura was concerned grocery trips counted as a success as long as Lila didn’t climb anything and Cooper didn’t start tossing around S.H.I.E.L.D. hand signs.

“They’re getting better.” The lady who ran the grocery store grinned at her as Lila and Cooper ran between the cart and the doors, trying to tap the doors before the sensor caught them and opened. “Didn’t knock a single display over today.”

“Yeah, they’re a bit more coordinated these days.” Laura grinned and bit back a comment about bones fusing and average motor development in five and six year olds. Instead she pulled out her wallet and paid in cash as the owner double bagged her groceries. “Thanks.”

“See you next time.” She called out from behind the counter and both Lila and Cooper lost their game as they stopped to wave back.

“Come on you two into the truck.” Laura laughed as they both glared at the sensor above the door. As she packed the bags into the space she’d designed in the bag of the truck specifically for groceries, she heard the doors opening as the two of them scrambled in. By the time she got into the driver's seat the two of them were in their car seats and signing so fast at each other their little hands went blurry.

Once they were home, as Laura was putting away the groceries, the phone rang. Lila picked it up and launched into Russian punctuated with giggles as she made her way towards Laura. She finished her thought into the phone before holding it out to Laura. “Mama, Aunt Nat.”

“Hello love.” Laura shot a frown at Lila who just blinked big eyes up at her like she hadn’t been told a dozen times not to answer the phone.

“Fury’s announced a re-focusing of S.H.I.E.L.D.” Natasha didn’t bother hiding the disdain in her voice as another line clicked onto the call. “Also, Clint’s on call too.”

“You only hate it because you weren’t in New Mexico.” Clint was clearly continuing a disagreement they’d already been having.

“No, I think it’s foolish because the whole point is that we have no idea what alien’s are capable of.” The eye roll was clear in her voice and Laura could tell they’d been going around in circles about whatever this was.

“Fill in the civilian?” She asked before either one could keep going. “What did Fury re-focus S.H.I.E.L.D. on?”

“Extraterrestrial defense.” Clint says it in a tone that gives away nothing about his own thoughts.

“We barely know what to expect from terrestrial forces, how are we supposed to prepare for forces we know nothing about?”

“Didn’t S.H.I.E.L.D. collect that robot from New Mexico?” Laura knew it wouldn’t be much but it was a starting point.

“The destroyer yeah.” He sounded almost disappointed as he said it. “Research on that has been-”

“They have no idea what it is, can’t even get into the damn thing.” Natasha interrupted with a huff. “Plus that’s just one thing, according to Dr. Foster, Thor said there are nine other worlds or universes or something.”

“And there’s no way of telling what they’re capable of or if they’ll attack at all.” Laura mused tapping the table and watching as Laura and Cooper played some game they’d made up with their dolls and the chess board.

“Exactly.”

“But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try, and it’s only been a day since the destroyer landed anyway.” Clint said and Laura smiled softly, he always believed in people he considered his. “I’m sure the labs will figure it out given some time.”

“Fury does seem to think that’s the one thing we don’t have.” Natasha added and then sighed. “Course we’ll follow the orders regardless.”

“I’m still amazed none of them can tell when you think they’re full of it.” Clint sounded almost impressed by that.

“It’s called being professional.”

“I don’t know the meaning of the word.” There was laughter in both their voices and Laura grinned.

“Of course this does mean it’ll be longer until we can get away.” The laughter was gone from Clint’s voice, replaced by regret.

“Ah, guess I wont get that new study anytime soon then.” Laura tried to keep her voice light but by the sounds Natasha and Clint made she doubted it had worked. “Do you have time to talk to the kids?”

“Yeah, I’m off shift for a bit, Nat’s technically between missions but you know what Fury’s like.” Clint said it quietly.

“He told me to stay close so I’m stuck at the triskelion for the time being. At least until he figures out what he’s up to.”

“Lila, Cooper.” Laura called out and they scrambled over. “Aunt Nat and dad are on the phone.”

Cooper pointed at the phone then made an oval shape with his fingers and placed the tips to beside his mouth, then up to near his eyes.

“No love, they’re not coming home anytime soon.” Laura hit the speaker button and put it down on the counter as both kids climbed up onto seats.

“Mama showed us the stars yesterday dad.” Lila said it as soon as the phone was put down. Her voice was quieter than usual but she was smiling anyway. “Cooper stayed up so late! I fell asleep though. Did you know they all have stories?”

“There are lots of stories in the stars.” Clint agreed easily but Laura could hear the strain in his voice, like he was remembering how much he missed while he was away.

“Which stories did mum tell you?” Natasha asked, her voice almost as quiet as Lila’s.

Lila launched in retelling the stories, with corrections and additions from Cooper. While they were occupied Laura set about making dinner. At least it seemed like the week couldn’t get any weirder.

Sunday at first seemed determined to prove Laura right; the week had been weird enough and now it was over. News reports contained only rehashings of the last week, reporters rolled their eyes or laughed about the weird times they were living in, and some clouds rolled in to drop dipping not quite rain on Laura’s head as she gardened.

Despite the rain Derek and his girls came over for proper iced tea. Kate spent the day getting her coveralls covered in mud with the help of Cooper and Lila. Susan helped Laura with the gardening and got plenty of mud on her nice skirt while doing so, and Derrek laughed as he told them about the last week in a tone that meant he thought he had the best sources in the world. Laura made sure to ooh and ah in all the right spots like she hadn’t heard it all from the folks on the front lines over the week.

Later that night, after dinner, after the Bishops had gone back to their own property, the news suddenly exploded. A big red monster had appeared in Harlem, tossing cars and roaring. Seemingly out of nowhere, the Hulk showed up. Just when most of Harlem seemed to have decided it was over, they realized the Hulk was there to fight this new monster.

Laura had never been happier not to recognize any of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who showed up in the backgrounds of the footage. Unlike the rest of the weird shit this week however she didn’t have anything other than the vaguest S.H.I.E.L.D. reports she’d ever read to give her more information. Sometimes being able to ghost around S.H.I.E.L.D.s computers was an advantage, sometimes it just made her want to send more annoyed letters to the agents who refused to write decent reports.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you like what I write and you want to buy me a coffee there's a link on my profile!

**Author's Note:**

> If you like what I write and you want to buy me a coffee for it there's a link on my profile


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